Borrowed Attention Gets You Noticed. Earned Attention Marketing Builds the Brand.
How a big, attention-grabbing campaign translates into something a small or mid-sized business can actually use.
There’s a reason the Sydney Sweeney campaign for Novig has been everywhere. It was built to get attention.
Novig’s “Just Sports” campaign put Sweeney at the center of a deliberately provocative creative concept designed to introduce a relatively young brand to a much larger audience. She isn’t simply a paid spokesperson, either. Sweeney joined the company as a strategic partner and equity holder and was involved in the campaign itself.
Whether you love the ad, hate it, or couldn’t care less about the controversy surrounding it, one thing is difficult to argue: people noticed.
Getting attention is not the same thing as building a brand.
That makes the campaign interesting for business owners—not because every business should copy the creative, but because it highlights one of marketing’s biggest challenges: once you get someone’s attention, what do you do with it?
Most Businesses Borrow Attention All the Time
Borrowed attention simply means putting your business in front of an audience that someone—or something—has already assembled.
Hiring a celebrity is borrowed attention. So is partnering with an influencer. But the same idea appears in much more ordinary marketing tactics:
· Sponsoring a community event or local fundraiser.
· Appearing on a podcast or local media segment.
· Running paid social or search advertising.
· Jumping into a relevant trend or cultural moment.
· Partnering with another local business.
· Getting featured by a creator, publication, or community page.
You didn’t build that audience. You’re temporarily getting access to it. And there is nothing wrong with that.
In fact, it can be extremely valuable. IZEA’s 2025 Trust in Influencer Marketing report found that 86% of surveyed consumers use social media to research brands before making purchases, showing just how influential creators and social platforms have become in the buying process. View the report
The problem starts when a business mistakes access to attention for ownership of attention. A creator can put you in front of 100,000 people. An ad can generate a million impressions. A controversial campaign can dominate the conversation for a week. But eventually the creator posts something else, the campaign ends, and the algorithm moves on.
Then what?
The Real Question: Does the Attention Transfer?
This is what makes the Novig campaign useful as a branding case study. Sydney Sweeney already has enormous awareness, so putting her in a bold campaign almost guarantees that some of her existing attention will spill over onto Novig.
But the long-term question is not simply whether people saw the ad. It is what they remember after seeing it.
· Did they remember Sydney Sweeney?
· Did they remember the controversy?
· Did they remember the creative?
· Or did they remember Novig—and why Novig is different?
That last question is where brand building begins. Attention has to transfer from the thing that attracted someone to the thing you actually want them to remember.
For Novig, the intended positioning is straightforward: the platform focuses on sports rather than the broader range of political, entertainment, and cultural prediction markets found elsewhere. Hence: “Just Sports.”
If people walk away remembering that distinction, the campaign may have accomplished much more than generating temporary buzz. If they remember only “that Sydney Sweeney ad,” the celebrity may have won more attention than the brand.
You Probably Can’t Hire Sydney Sweeney. You Don’t Need To.
This is where the lesson becomes much more useful for a small or mid-sized business.
Most businesses are not going to spend millions of dollars on a celebrity campaign. That does not mean they can’t create a pattern interrupt. The goal isn’t celebrity. The goal is to give someone a reason to stop.
That reason could be surprising, funny, unexpected, slightly provocative, extremely useful, or simply very different from everything else in the category. You do not need national controversy. Sometimes you just need your town—or your industry—talking about you.
A Downsized Version: The Local Gym
Most gym advertising looks almost identical: people lifting weights, before-and-after photos, “Join Today,” “New Year, New You,” or a discounted membership offer.
Now imagine a local gym spends a few hundred dollars creating a clear display case for its lobby, a local festival, or a community event. Inside is a bathroom scale, a stack of fad-diet books, and a fake “30-Day Miracle Workout.” Across the front:
BREAK IN CASE OF ANOTHER FAILED FITNESS PLAN.
Next to it is a small hammer. Underneath, the message says: “We’re not selling another quick fix.” A QR code gives people a free, straightforward two-week beginner plan built around realistic workouts and nutrition.
Now you have a pattern interrupt. People photograph it. Someone makes a Reel. A local news page or community account shares it. Members send it to friends. The stunt may cost a few hundred dollars instead of a few million.
That is your borrowed-attention moment. But the display is not the strategy. It is the doorway.
The Stunt Gets Attention. What Follows Earns It.
After the gym gets people looking, the next week of content could include:
· A coach explaining why extreme fitness plans usually fail.
· A member talking honestly about starting when they were completely out of shape.
· A simple three-day workout someone can actually follow.
· A post explaining realistic nutrition without pushing supplements.
· A video titled, “You don’t need motivation. You need a plan you can actually repeat.”
Now the business is no longer relying on the stunt. It is demonstrating expertise, developing a voice, and reinforcing what it stands for. People who initially stopped because of the ridiculous glass case may begin following because the business is actually useful.
That is the transition from borrowed attention to earned attention.
The Same Model Works Almost Anywhere
· Restaurant: Create one ridiculous limited-edition menu item that sparks conversation, then use the attention to introduce the food, chef, and story behind the restaurant.
· Landscaping company: Run an “Ugliest Lawn in Town” competition, then follow it with educational content showing homeowners how to fix common lawn problems.
· Financial advisor: Use a sharp message such as “YOUR 401(K) DOESN’T CARE ABOUT YOUR VISION BOARD,” then drive people to a genuinely useful retirement checklist.
· Golf course: Challenge the idea that golf has to be stuffy, intimidating, or reserved for serious players—and sell the experience instead of another generic photo of a green.
· Manufacturer: Destroy or stress-test one of your own products on camera to demonstrate exactly how much abuse it can take.
· B2B company: Publish the thing your industry normally refuses to say out loud, then back it up with useful data, expertise, or a practical solution.
The idea does not have to be expensive. It has to be noticeable, relevant, and connected to what the business actually stands for.
Random shock gets attention. Strategic shock gives the attention somewhere to go.
The Attention Marketing Ladder
A small business can turn this into a simple five-step framework:
1. Interrupt — Give someone a reason to stop.
2. Connect — Make sure the idea ties directly to the business and its positioning.
3. Deliver — Give people something useful, entertaining, or valuable after they arrive.
4. Capture — Give them a reason to follow, subscribe, visit, inquire, or buy.
5. Repeat — Keep delivering enough value that you no longer need the stunt to earn their attention.
Borrowed attention → earned attention → owned audience.
The first step can happen overnight. The others take time.
Earned Attention Is Where the Real Value Compounds
Earned attention happens when people begin paying attention because of what you consistently give them. Maybe your content genuinely teaches them something. Maybe customers recommend you constantly. Maybe your customer experience is memorable enough that people naturally talk about it. Maybe your company has a strong point of view in an industry full of businesses saying exactly the same thing.
That kind of attention usually cannot be manufactured overnight. It accumulates. That is why consistency matters so much in marketing. You are not trying to create isolated posts, ads, or campaigns. You are repeatedly reinforcing an idea about your business.
Research released by VCCP Media and Amplified in 2025 found that distinctive brand assets can help advertising produce stronger brand and business effects even within extremely short periods of consumer attention. Read the research
Getting someone’s attention is useful. Making sure they know it was you is more important.
Reach Is Not the Whole Scorecard
Business owners naturally get excited about big numbers: 50,000 views, 500 shares, or one million impressions. Those numbers matter, but they are not the finish line.
Nielsen’s 2025 Marketing ROI Blueprint emphasizes connecting campaign activity with actual business outcomes such as sales and brand lift, rather than treating delivery metrics as success by themselves. See Nielsen’s Marketing ROI Blueprint
For a small business, you do not need a massive analytics department. Just keep asking what happened after the attention:
· Did website traffic increase?
· Did people search for your business?
· Did they follow you or join your email list?
· Did inquiries or appointments increase?
· Did someone walk through the door or make a purchase?
· Did customers come back or tell someone else?
That is the path from attention to marketing value.
Eventually, Own Some of the Relationship
The strongest outcome is not simply borrowed or earned attention. It is turning some of that attention into a relationship you can reach again: an email subscriber, a customer record, a repeat buyer, a website visitor who knows where to find you, or a community that actively follows the business.
The UK Data & Marketing Association’s 2025 research found stronger ROI and response effects for campaigns using customer data, reinforcing the value of first-party relationships. Read The Value of Customer Data Report 2025
You do not control Instagram. You do not control TikTok. You do not control Google. And you definitely do not control somebody else’s audience. But you can gradually build relationships with customers who choose to stay connected to you.
That is when marketing starts compounding.
Borrow the Attention. Then Earn the Next Minute.
The lesson from a campaign like Novig’s is not that every business needs a celebrity, and it certainly is not that every company should manufacture controversy.
It is that attention can be engineered.
A big company might do it with Sydney Sweeney. A small business might do it with a $300 stunt, a clever sign, an unusual partnership, one bold idea, or a piece of content that says what everyone else in the industry is afraid to say.
The budget changes. The principle does not.
Give people a reason to stop. Then make sure there is something behind the attention when they arrive.
The first impression may be borrowed. The second one has to be earned. And if you keep earning it long enough, eventually you may not need to borrow nearly as much attention in the first place.
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