Micro Marketing at a Marathon Expo

Micro level marketing is an important part of the track and field world. There is no better place to connect one on one with a target market then at a major marathon or any other running event. I recently ran the Chicago marathon (that is another blog that most likely won’t go on here).  I had spent the morning interviewing elite athletes and spent the afternoon at the expo generally exploring but was intrigued on what the function of the expo exactly was, the following are some pictures with the responses on how the marathon expo works. 

I’ll start first with the Chicago Area Runners Association- “It is good to get our name out to the community and show that we support our local runners. We might not sign up a lot of members due to participants being out state but it is really to show that we support the sport of running”

All the major shoe companies were there including Brooks (pictured above), Saucony, Mizuno, Asics and Nike. Nike having the largest presence but it is known that Nike has the most money to spin. The booths offered custom fitting and apparel that is not sold in stores.  The workers at the booth were more than friendly and I talked for quite a while with an Asics rep that was a regional apparel rep. He explained that the relationships built on a ground level such as a marathon expo bring in sales ( though he would not state numbers), introduce new product  and  more importantly “begin to make customers loyal to a brand”. 

Another interesting aspect was the use of elite athletes.  Brooks circulated their elite club of Brooks-Hansons athletes, Nike brought in middle distance stars not running and Asics brought in their biggest star that actually dropped out of the marathon-Ryan Hall.  The line was very long.

What I was most surprised about was the non-running brands that were there.  VW was the most noticeable one with a neat installation piece of a doodle bug. Verizon had a booth, along with many charities.

One could not only buy or try a lot of products at the expo but you were give a lot of products in your Marathon expo bag. This of course give advertisers instant connection to an audience (I will admit I did use quite a few of the free products and pretty much ate my way through the expo)  Below is just a sample of the stuff I was able to take home with with me.