Creating an Owned Audience With Branded Running Apps

Key Takeaways

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Focus Allocation — Run Tracking Apps: Almost every leading running apparel brand owns or is affiliated with a major run tracking app. Strava & Pacer Health are the top fitness tracking apps that remain independent.

Tactics — Loyalty & Brand Building With Apps: Over 1 million North Americans use branded run tracking apps every month on Android Alone. Leading run apparel brands are leveraging these apps to strengthen their relationship with a dedicated user base.

Tactics — Driving eCommerce With Apps: Adidas’ Runtastic blog and social accounts not only build brand, but feature strong CTAs to ‘Shop Adidas’ by visiting Adidas’ eCommerce site. Using run tracking apps and their associated sites, blogs, and social accounts to drive traffic to eCommerce is a tactic replicated by several other major running apparel brands as well.
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Social Content — At-Home Bodyweight Workout Videos: The top performing Instagram posts for Runtastic are carousel videos with at-home bodyweight workout plans, typically delivered by an influencer/brand ambassador. This content type also tends to perform best on Instagram for other leading run apparel brands.

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Several leading running apparel brands have acquired or developed popular run tracking apps.

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In total, the top run tracking apps serve over 1 million highly engaged North American runners on Android that use their app at least once per month. 

This figure does not include iOS.

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Under Armour’s Map My Run App has consistently remained the most popular branded tracking app amongst runners, only second to Strava.

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Pacer and Strava are the two largest run tracking apps that are not owned by running apparel brands.

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Adidas’ Runtastic app has its own blog and social accounts (@adidasruntastic) that are separate from the @adidasrunning account. Beyond brand building, the Runtastic blog also drives users to Adidas’ eCommerce site.

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The top articles on the Runtastic blog in July focused on strength training and at-home workouts for beginners:

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The top performing Instagram posts for Runtastic are carousel videos with at-home bodyweight workout plans, typically delivered by an influencer/brand ambassador.