Liberty Mt. Trail Series
The Liberty Mountain Trail Series is an annual series of 5 races: Deep Hollow Half Marathon & 5K, Valley View Mike Donahue Memorial 5-Miler, Reindeer Run 2-Miler, Arctic 5K, and King of the Mountain 1-Mile Uphill.
This year, we updated the branding of our promotional materials, adjusted our paid social ads, and targeted advertising to participants of the local Virginia 10-Miler race (unaffiliated). These adjustments have helped us achieve the following increases in registration compared to the previous year:
Deep Hollow: 12.8% increase
Valley View: 4.71% increase
Reindeer Run: 15.1% increase
Arctic 5K: TBD (Feb. 1)
King of the Mountain: TBD (March 1)
Promotional Formats
Race Shirts
Because these are annual races, we completely overhaul our race shirts each year. Race shirts are a big deal for runners and they will wear them in other events throughout the year. To keep our participants’ collections diverse, we very loosely match the shirt to the poster branding. Not pictured are the shirt backs, which feature the race date and sponsors.
The Deep Hollow shirts featured a forested run to represent the lush landscapes our participants get to enjoy during this race.
The Valley View shirts featured a paratrooper in honor of the late Major Mike Donahue, whose legacy we honor at this race.
Run, run Rudolph, Santa's gotta make it to town! The Reindeer Run shirts featured Santa's best for our holiday run.
The Arctic 5K shirts will feature a frosty penguin as our runners brave the frigid winter weather. This race will take place on Feb. 1, 2025.
King of the Mountain is not for the weak; runners' shirts will bear bold lettering and a crown to represent the title they seek! This race will take place on March 1, 2025.
Targeted Marketing
Email blasts and Facebook ads have been extremely effective for drawing in registrations. Because this trail series is sponsored by Liberty University and the student base is ever-evolving, we send registration reminders to all students. Liberty faculty and staff participate yearly in the (external) Virginia 10-Miler race. We also target these participants for these emails. After each email blast, we earn roughly 30-40% of our event registrations within the next 3 days.
Each email blasts features the event info, t-shirt registration deadline, and a direct link to register for the event.
Social Media
For each of our races, we promote via social media posts and paid ads. Social media is the best way we’ve found to let our repeat runners know their favorite race is coming up. During each race, we also have live social media coverage throughout the event (no shame in creating a little FOMO, right?). After the races, race photos get posted to Facebook. In the race world, photos are a big deal! Runners always want a photo of themselves crossing the finish line and on the trails. Additionally, we post recap Reels for each race. You can view these below!
Photography
Grit. Perseverance. Community. Triumph. My photographers capture these moments at each of our races. Photos hold a special place in race culture, and we take care to make sure each racer gets a photo at our events. Below are a few samples of my team’s work.
Creative Director • Project Manager • Media Planner • Marketing Strategist