How we Helped Resurrect an Iconic NYC Race Series

If you’re a triathlete in the NYC Metro Area, chances are you raced at a New York Triathlon (NYTRI) event. Many athletes contribute their start to the series, as NYTRI has been the heart and soul of multisport racing from the very beginning. USA Triathlon even says NYTRI’s founder may have been the one to introduce the duathlon to the industry back in 1984.

Fast forward 30 years and with 100’s of new races to choose from, NYTRI was having a tough time keeping up with the competition. Overall attendance was on a steady five-year decline, largely in part due to NYTRI’s aging infrastructure and old technology. I joined forces with the new Race Director to help stop the decline and to resurrect the iconic NYC race series.

About

The New York Triathlon (NYTRI) has been fully dedicated to putting on fun, safe and successful races throughout the NYC, Staten Island, Long Island and Upstate NY areas since 1983. Since then, over 600 multi-sport events (triathlons and duathlons) are credited to its long history. Over the years, NYTRI has gained a following of 350 members and can boast a reach of over 15,000 athletes in the area.

Each year NYTRI puts on up to ten separate events, with 80% of the events being sprint distances (quarter-mile swim, 12-mile bike ride and a 3-mile run). This enables the NYTRI events to be un-intimidating for beginners as well as a well-run event for experienced athletes, such as an Ironmen or ultra marathoners.

The Challenge

Initially, NYTRI’s website had worked well to support the multiple annual events for some time, however, while there was steady growth in the industry, NYTRI was on a five-year decline in attendees. NYTRI was in need of a new fresh, modern website and marketing initiatives to help keep up with current trends, expand their reach and grow their membership.

Strategy & Consulting

Branding & Design

Website Design & Development

Integrated Marketing

New York Triathlon (NYTRI) website redesign - shown on a website, tablet and mobile devices

The Solutions

New York Triathlon (NYTRI) website redesign - before and after

Phase 1
Complete Website Overhaul

We gave the NYTRI brand a complete overhaul and designed a new website that would easily communicate the friendly and adventurous spirit of the vibrant NYTRI community to a broader audience. The design was based on a new photo collage which showcases the iconic event locations, such as New York City’s Central Park and the Staten Island Verrazano bridge, along with the successes of the individual athletes. The website was developed on the WordPress platform, making it visually pleasing, responsive and user-friendly. These new website enhancements and improvements provided NYTRI with the ability to offer more information, a smoother user experience, and ultimately provide more value and utility for its members and the new athletes of this growing community.

View Website

THE RESULTS

+856

New Athletes
in 2017

+28%

Average Increase
in Attendance

Phase 2
Integrated Marketing Campaign

Using an integrated approach to get the rebrand out to new and current athletes, the website launch was promoted via email and social media posts. A street team of Brand Ambassadors, armed with posters and postcards, were sent to athletic events across the NYC Metro area. Facebook and Instagram Pay-Per-Click (PPC) ads were created to further promote the last three events in the series while an organic #readytotri campaign was created to encourage beginner athletes to join the un-intimidating race series.

A series of posters, rack cards and business cards

Facebook Brand Awareness & Social Selling Campaigns

After the new website launched, we set out to build brand awareness through social media management. While NYTRI had a small Facebook presence from the previous years, pretty much the entire executive team were newbies to social media. Because of this, we developed a short-term strategy to generate leads and sales, while still keeping the executive team comfortable by having a lean advertising budget.

A direct response pay-per-click advertising campaign which targeted athletes by age, location and interests ran over a three-month time period. The paid ads were used to grab people’s attention while a series of organic posts were created to help build long-term relationships with the athletes.

#readytotri

We used #motivationalmonday to promote our #readytotri hashtag for encouraging beginner athletes to try a triathlon or duathlon for the first time. We also used the posts to inspire our tired athletes to get up and get out there in case they needed a little extra push.

A series of New York Triathlon (NYTRI) Facebook and Instagram #motivationalmonday posts
A series of New York Triathlon (NYTRI) Facebook and Instagram countdown posts

The Countdowns

Nothing gets an athlete going faster than the sound of the gun going off on the starting line. We used the last few days before each event to get our athletes psyched for the upcoming race, as well as a final attempt to get in last minute registrations.

The Conversations

For the first time in NYTRI history, the athletes helped create upcoming race schedule. By having someone monitor, respond to and encouraging conversations on Facebook, the new Executive Team was able to fully understand the wants and needs of their community. We heard the requests, and based on the responses felt it would be possible to fulfill them. In 2017 the Facebook community asked to resurrect races at Lake Welch/Harriman Park and in Brooklyn. In 2018 NYTRI delivered and added the two locations to their roster of events.

Facebook Posts showing customer engagement
Three examples of A/B/C split tests for New York Triathlon (NYTRI) Facebook Ad Campaign

The Pay Per Click (PPC) Ads

Pay Per Click ads were created and delivered during the last three months of the season. While it would seem that each race should be marketed in the same manner, the actual races themselves are very different and needed their own plan. In addition to creating separate plans for each event, We developed A/B/C tests for each campaign to ensure we would receive the optimal results.

The Metrics

Below are the overall results form three Facebook campaigns. We pulled our data from each campaign, tallied them up then compared our numbers to benchmarks made by industry experts (Marketing Professionals and Social Media Today.) Here’s a quick peek to see how my stats stacked up against the rest.

COST PER THOUSAND IMPRESSIONS (CPMS)
The Cost Per Thousand Impressions (CPM) is used to indicate the price of 1,000 advertisement impressions. This metric helps measure performance against cost. In traditional advertising buying your CPM is a set cost. You will pay X amount of dollars for 1,000 impressions. In Facebook advertising your CPM can fluctuate based on two major factors; how easy it is to reach a user in your target audience and the number of competing campaigns trying to reach the same target audience as you.

For instance, sometimes you will see huge fluctuations in CPM’s around large shopping events like Cyber Monday and major holidays. In NYTRI’s case, the New York City Duathlon (NYCDU) race was held on Labor Day Weekend. This presented an interesting problem as not only was the CPM being driven up due to the increase in overall advertisements, any native Ny’er will tell you….people tend to leave the city on Labor Day for one last day at the beach before Winter sets in. This means we needed to cast a larger net with a higher number of impressions for this event. The total advertising spend for this particular event was twice as much than the other races, which did not fall on a major holiday weekend. Even with these challenges, we were still able to gain a 25% increase in attendance over prior years.

COST PER CLICK (CPC)
The Cost Per Click (CPC) is another metric for tracking value and effectiveness of a campaign. It represents the cost to the advertiser every time someone clicks on their ad. Cost per clicks can vary greatly due to a variety of factors including the platform on which you’re advertising, the type of advertising used, the target audience, the product or service being promoted, and the bidding strategy. One way to ensure the best CPC for an ad is to conduct an A/B test, as we did with NYTRI. By moderating and adjusting our ads throughout the three month time period, we were able to ensure we were running advertisements at the lowest CPC possible.

CLICK THROUGH RATE (CTR)
The Click Through Rate (CTR) is a great indicator of how well an ad is resonating with an audience. It is the actual number of clicks that an ad received per the number of times the ad was viewed. This is an excellent metric when you are looking to drive conversions or create leads. The CTR rate can be used to determine if the ad’s creative and content are resonating with an audience who may be already fatigued by the numerous number of paid posts they see in any given day. A higher CTR shows a well-performing ad.

OVERALL RESULTS
(Three Campaigns)

$5.01

CPM
(Cost per Thousand
Impressions)

$0.18

CPC
(Cost Per Click)

1.15%

CTR
(Click Through
Rates)

MY RESULTS VS. INDUSTRY AVERAGE

Graphs used to illustrate a better than average CPI, CPC and CTR for New York Triathlon Facebook Ad PPC Campaign
*Average rates based on benchmarks by Marketing Professionals
https://www.marketingprofs.com/charts/2017/32706/facebook-advertising-benchmarks-for-2q17
and Social Media Today
https://www.socialmediatoday.com/marketing/2017-facebook-advertising-benchmarks

The Results

Graphs used to illustrate YOY attendance

2016 – 2017% Increase in Registrations

*Race results from 2015 which was NOT held on Labor Day Weekend.

Close up - Graphs used to illustrate YOY attendance

A Word From My Client

Headshot for Ron Darress

Ron Darress,
Director, New York Triathlon

When I met Robert at a trade show, I noticed how well he worked in a team. When we spoke on the phone Robert reached into my business for my ideas. The follow up questionnaire was very detailed. It helped to get a handle of what was going on with every piece of my project. The quote was spot on and made my budget very happy. There is a lot at stake when you recommend someone, I have complete confidence that they will be satisfied with the efforts and results.