The Canada Army Run is a “military” race from start to finish. This event includes a half marathon and 5k for everyday runners and the ill, injured and disabled. The race is to celebrate the spirit of community for both Canadians and the Canadian Armed Forces. With over 25,000 participants, the Canada Army Run is an annual tribute to the men and women who serve at home and abroad. We are joining in the celebration by spotlighting The Canada Army Run as our Featured Bag of the Month!
Event Details
- Endurance – Half Marathon & 5k
- Location – Ottawa, Canada
- Participants – 25,000
- First Year Customer
In our first conversation with the team, it was clear that they wanted to incorporate a digital solution to replace the traditional event bag. With an event of this size, it is a huge operational feat to stuff 25,000 bags. Not to mention, the high-cost for sponsors to produce physical materials with no visibility into the performance. With the largest events around the globe using the platform, The Canada Army Run knew it was clear that Virtual Event Bags would be the ideal platform to roll out their digital event bag.
The Plan
For any event trying something new, the best results are achieved when a clear and defined plan has been laid out. The Virtual Event Bag is no different. For Canada Army Run, their plan was to offer placements in the bag to the sponsors and participating vendors free of charge. For them, the ultimate value of the product was providing an additional opportunity for sponsors while being able to share key event information such as course maps, apparel for purchase or other announcements. In comparing these new opportunities to the cost, the event concluded it was “well worth the cost.”
The Event Bag
There were three key things we noticed about the Canada Army Run bag, lingual diversity, sponsor variety, and social media savvy.
Lingual Diversity
Because the event was held in a multi-lingual city, the organization had to create placements that were both in French and English. In the picture below, you can see an example of how that looked.
Sponsor Variety
The bag had it all, apparel, services, and a mix of health supplements. This is just an example, their bag included 39 offers all of which had a niche.
Social Media Savvy
Now here is a best practice that we preach, but not everyone follows. Promote your social media! We’re giving two thumbs up to Canada Army Run for being the model of social savviness.
The Results
Each bag comes with reporting. There is a report for the overall performance of the bag and one for each placement in the bag. The key metrics for the overall performance are the visit rate and the views per visitor. On average, bags will have a visit rate of 65-75% with their audience with the average views per visitor being around 1.5-2.
Canada Army Run had a visit rate of 86.3% with a dead on 3 views per visitor!
Thier visit rate success is a result of two things. The use of the invitations in the platform and the timing in which they were sent. Because they were on our professional plan, they had three invitations to send to their participants. They sent all three prior to the event and in a short period. Doing that is good practice because you catch your audience at the height of their anticipation for the event. Making them more likely to take action on what you, the event, are offering.
The Kicker
With all the prep that went into creating this bag, one could assume that there was a lot of time involved in this process. Well, you would be wrong. Canada Army Run started their bag five weeks before their event! In that time, they set up the bag, communicated with sponsors to create 39 placements, and had great success engaging their audience.
Are you a race director considering if you should use our platform? Let this be an example to you on the ease of working in our tool. Take the time to check out our example bag or if you’re ready for next steps, schedule a demo with us!
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