Race directors use RunSignup’s free email marketing to send 25 million communications in September

Race Directors and nonprofits using RunSignup | GiveSignup’s free technology for endurance events reached a new milestone in September by sending more than 25 million emails to their contacts in a single month. Though the endurance industry is still recovering from the impact of COVID-19, the record month in emails offers an encouraging sign that race organizers are actively engaged with their communities.

RunSignup | GiveSignup first released their email marketing platform in 2015, allowing race directors, timers, and nonprofits to send marketing and logistical emails to event participants and custom email lists directly from their race dashboard. With incremental technology enhancements and a growing customer base, usage of the platform continues to increase. While there was a temporary dip in email sends in March and April, the number of emails sent in 2020 is up 20% over this point in 2019, and September’s usage was up 34% compared to September of 2019.

RunSignup | GiveSignup CEO and Founder Bob Bickel said, “Now more than ever, race organizers and nonprofits are looking to reduce costs and increase efficiencies to keep their businesses running. RunSignup’s email marketing system and other integrated marketing tools are a free and effective way for races to maintain contact with previous participants and reach new audiences on a shoestring budget”.

Email marketing isn’t the only RunSignup | GiveSignup marketing tool that has seen expanded use in 2020. Data from April through September of 2020 shows:

• Referrals are key. Referral Rewards is the marketing tool that allows a race director to automatically offer a refund (or premium swag) to a participant when they successful refer a set number of registrants. During the last 6 months, when a race turned on referral rewards, they saw 17% of all registration dollars came from referrals, compared to just 7% for the same period in 2019.
• Social still matters – even more so for virtual events. More than 1.5 million participants joined a group or team for their race in the last six months, with 33% of participants joining when a team option was provided.
• Photos provide engagement. With free uploading of both an organizers photos and participant images, the photo platform creates a race day excitement whether a race is virtual or in-person. In September alone, more than 35,000 photos were uploaded for sharing. Races using RunSignup | GiveSignup’s technology to promote their events have the added benefit of RaceInsights, built-in analytics machine that tracks the success of marketing efforts. In addition to reporting on referrals, teams, repeat participation, and demographics, RaceInsights provides race directors with detailed information about how many page views, registrations, and donations they received for each of those 25 million emails sent.