It’s that time of year, January’s editions of Runners World or Trail Runner have hit your door mat or maybe Triathlete or UltraRunner or any combination of them, you’ve read the shoes reviews, the interview with the celebrity runner, the 101 training tips that you’ve never tried before (but you vaguely remember seeing around this time last year) and made a mental note to try the healthy post run meal. Now you’re at the end of the magazine, you find yourself flicking through the last half a dozen pages and looking at the ads for races; some catch your eye and some don’t.
Now as the post title alludes to I am no marketer but I am a complete sucker for marketing, make it appear difficult, unique, a bit hair-brained or just plain hazardous and I am often found merrily figuring out how I could get there and even punching my credit card number into my keyboard. Here are a few that appeal, excuse my cropping:
Artful, eye catching and simple, a bit dangerous and strangely both Canadian!
At the opposite end of the spectrum you have some that are over worded, poorly photographed home crafted versions, I have actually run the Calico race, (report, photos etc here ) it’s a beautiful high desert race that really could have such a better advertisement!
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It actually gets worse with Marathons:
Now I am not saying I could do any better but if a picture is worth 1000 words, please use the picture in fact use two or three! Although I suppose if all else fails we all know sexy sells right!
wow... I would have to agree... the US marketing sucks. I often wonder how some of the commercials we watch even make it on TV. Waste of money if you can't get it right.
ReplyDeleteIf it were my money I would be all over the canadian ones based on the ad alone.
Hey was that Scary Spice in 2nd place?
ReplyDeleteI don't know about the stiletto race. I have enough foot issues just running in good running shoes.
ReplyDeleteGreat observations. I am a sucker for good marketing too - both races you mentioned are ones that have caught my eye multiple times!
ReplyDeleteI totally agree with you, some of the advertisements for the races are horrible. It's like I made them on photoshop. Hire someone from a college to get it done and looking way more nice and official :)
ReplyDeleteYep, I also agree with you. In general, the US marathon ads are pretty blah and often with too many words. Maybe they feel they don't have to try as hard.
ReplyDeleteI've seen stiletto heels break just when a gal walks in them- let alone run in them. I guess it's one way to prevent heel striking and promote hitting the ground on the mid/fore foot.