Students and parents searching for scholarships or grants on Sallie, a sister website of private student loan lender Sallie Mae, may soon see ads for cars or apparel brands.

In March, Sallie launched Backpack Media, an advertising business that gives brands access to its data on Gen Z and Gen Alpha students. Advertisers use that data to target people across Sallie's own properties, across the open web and on streaming platforms.

Marco Steinsieck, former head of Sephora's retail media business, leads Backpack Media. He is building out the venture as lenders and consumer platforms race to monetize first-party data through retail media-style offerings.

Munif Jaafar, senior director of strategy and revenue at Backpack Media, joined the company in March from Macy's Media Network, where he was head of ad sales. He framed the offering around the depth of Sallie's audience insight.

"We're empowering Gen Z by knowing their financial, their educational, and housing attributes, and by knowing what life stages that they're across," Jaafar said.

The pitch signals how far student finance platforms intend to push into advertising. By combining financial, educational and housing attributes with life-stage data, Backpack Media can offer advertisers something most retail media networks cannot: a longitudinal view of a student's major decisions, from college selection to housing to credit.

For car and apparel brands, the appeal is direct access to a demographic at the point when it forms purchasing habits. For Sallie, the venture opens a new revenue stream beyond lending.

The move also raises the stakes on privacy expectations for a platform whose users arrive seeking financial aid. Students and parents visiting Sallie for scholarships and grants will now encounter advertising built on the same data they generate there — a dynamic Backpack Media will have to manage as it scales.

With a Sephora retail media veteran at the helm and a Macy's Media Network ad sales leader shaping strategy, Backpack Media has installed leadership with proven retail media credentials. Whether students embrace that trade — or push back — will shape how quickly Sallie's data business grows.