March 7, 2016

In the 21st Century, Marathons, Triathlons and OCR events are not just about the competition, a race is an experience. Endurance events now have a new goal: providing a pleasurable experience for participants. Increasing attendance at such events, is due impart to the variety of extra enhancements offered at marathons. Free race photos are a leading player in enriching the runner’s experience. Free race photos benefit three separate parties: the event, the sponsors and the participants.

Free Race Photos Benefit Three Parties

The Event

All leading endurance events worldwide offer their participants race photos. Organizers want their event to shine, and pictures are a way to highlight the success of an event. Free race photos add an extra element of excitement to an event. By advertising free race photos to runners, marathons become more attractive to target participants.

The Sponsors

In sponsoring race photos, companies are harnessing a new type of marketing. Photos feature the sponsor’s logo as well as the race’s trademark. When runners share photos on social media, they generate extensive reach for the brand. By sponsoring the photos, companies reap much gratitude from participants. Runners are very thankful to sponsors for eliminating exorbitant fees normally charged to access marathon photos.

The Participants

Runners want pictures from their race. Whether participants are serious runners or running for fun, every one of them is excited to see snapshots of themselves during the race. Just as runners greatly anticipate their post-race timing results, similarly they look forward to photos from the event. Participants delight not only in seeing the pictures but also in sharing them friends and family. Much emphasis is put on the “runner’s experience.” The best way to amplify the marathon experience is to keep the excitement going after the race with memorable photos.

Picking Your Free Race Photography Platform

The Ideal Race Photography Platform

When looking for a free race photography technology, there are several things to consider: value for sponsors, accuracy, speed and social aspects. From its inception, Pic2Go’s mission has been to bring it’s clients the best in regard to these specific factors.

Pic2Go Free Race Photography

Pic2Go’s Platform combines social media marketing with sponsorship, and brings photos to participants quickly and accurately. Using its patent-pending 2D barcodes on bibs - Pic2Go automates race photo-tagging and branded social sharing. With minutes to hours after the race, photos become available to runners through the event website. As soon as participants share their photos, sponsors automatically begin benefiting from their sponsorship. Pic2Go repeatedly works with big brands like Samsung, Adidas, Gillette and Nike. There is clearly something about this service that is golden.

Facts and Figures

The 2015 USA Half Marathon Invitational, generated 510,000 impressions on Facebook.

At this year’s Tel Aviv Samsung Marathon, 15,500 people created their personal photo album to be socially shared. Runners’ Facebook photo sharing resulted in a colossal 17,000,000 impressions!

The Vodafone Malta Marathon 2016 had a record number of participants. Through Pic2Go’s photo platform, 4,100,000 impressions were made.

The 2016 Trinity River Levee Run offered Free Race Photos sponsored by Cypress at Trinity Groves, and generated 460,000 impressions within 48 hours!

Pic2Go Performance Photos at 2016 Trinity River Levee Run

Written by Sarah Marlowe - Marketing and Sponsorship Advisor at Pic2Go