CASE STUDY
Mindworks
How we helped a UChicago Booth behavioral science museum grew its Instagram following by 22.3%,
and built a a content system their small team could sustain.
What Happened
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Mindworks is part museum, part research lab — operated by the Roman Family Center for Decision Research at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.
Located in the heart of the Chicago Loop, it's where visitors explore how behavioral science shapes daily life through interactive exhibits and real research studies.
Since opening in 2021, more than 50,000 visitors from 75+ countries have walked through its doors.
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Mindworks wanted to grow their digital presence, especially on Instagram, and strengthen connections with their target audience on social media.
They also wanted a game plan for increasing winter visits. While summer in-person engagement is strong, visits to the space decline due to the natural decrease in tourism and foot traffic during colder months.
Additionally, their small team needed a system for managing content creation more efficiently.
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Together, we set an ambitious growth target for a niche content subject: gain 525 new Instagram followers, reaching 2,750 total followers by February 24, 2025.
Their broader goals included:
Shifting content toward storytelling about the space and visitors.
Increasing engagement and reach by creating relevant content like polling followers to discover what they want to learn about behavioral science or tying Mindworks to shared cultural moments.
Implementing a streamlined content planning workflow to maximize efficiency and ensure consistency.
Experimenting with paid digital campaigns to amplify reach and attract new followers.
The broader content shift moved away from institutional messaging toward storytelling — featuring the space, the visitors, and the science in ways that felt relevant and shareable. That meant polling followers on what they wanted to learn, tying posts to cultural moments like Spotify Wrapped, and running a New Year's lead generation campaign built around the message: follow Mindworks for real advice on designing your best 2025.
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We guided the Mindworks team to optimize Reels, align posts with cultural moments, and run two targeted campaigns — a New Year's lead generation campaign and a Bulls Tickets Giveaway — that drove a sharp follower spike.
On the operational side, we built an AirTable base that gave the team a clear content planning workflow, improved internal collaboration, and made repurposing top-performing content easy. Fewer decisions, more consistency.
"[NEW Marketing Solutions] was a tremendous asset as we navigated staff transitions on our social media team. She set up effective collaboration tools, helped us think conceptually about our goals and audiences, ran cost-effective ads, and provided insightful analytics and reporting."
— Chris Partridge, Director of Communications at the Roman Family Center for Decision Research
Results
Mindworks saw significant success in three key areas.
Follower Growth: Instagram followers grew by 22.3% (496 new followers) between October 2024 and February 2025, driven by influencer partnerships and a strategic lead generation campaign.
Engagement & Reach: December alone saw a 641.4% increase in reach and a 172.4% boost in views, with January sustaining momentum through a 109.5% rise in interactions. Content tied to cultural and seasonal themes, like Spotify Wrapped, performed particularly well.
Operational Efficiency: Introducing an AirTable-based content planning system streamlined workflow, improved collaboration, and ensured content consistency.
"[NEW Marketing Solutions] was a tremendous asset as we navigated staff transitions on our social media team. She set up effective collaboration tools, helped us think conceptually about our goals and audiences, ran cost-effective ads, and provided insightful analytics and reporting."
— Chris Partridge, Director of Communications at the Roman Family Center for Decision Research
FAQs About Mindworks
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For Mindworks, it started with understanding what their audience actually wanted to learn — then building content around that, not around internal messaging priorities. Polling followers, tying posts to cultural moments, and investing in Reels over static posts made the biggest difference in reach.
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By making the subject feel relevant to everyday life. Behavioral science is everywhere — in how people make decisions, form habits, and react to the world around them. Once content started reflecting that, rather than leading with academic framing, engagement followed.
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Yes — with the right system. A content planning workflow (we use AirTable) that handles scheduling, collaboration, and content repurposing can dramatically reduce the number of decisions a small team has to make each week. Consistency becomes a byproduct of the system, not a daily act of willpower.
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Mindworks saw measurable results within the first 60 days, with the sharpest growth happening between December and January during targeted campaign periods. Sustained growth required consistent posting plus paid amplification.
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Behavioral science marketing applies research on how people make decisions — concepts like social proof, the bandwagon effect, and the fresh start effect — to real marketing strategy. It's the difference between guessing what might work and understanding why people say ye