WHAT IF EVERYBODY RAN?
Uncovering the True Power of Running.
SUMMARY
FOLLOW THE CONVERSATION in the running world and you’ll quickly see that it focuses almost
exclusively on individual benefits. Typical magazine article: How to improve your 10k time.
Typical advertising message: Running makes you happier. Typical scientific study: Running strengthens
your memory. Typical social media post: I ran 5 miles today and I feel great!
So the planning team posed a question: What if we flipped this conversation? If running helps runners in
all these ways, how does that, in turn, help the people around them? How could running help the world?
This would be a shift for the category and a bold stance for a brand that’s viewed as a niche player for
serious runners. So what happened when we did this? Ironically, by instigating a broader conversation,
Mizuno connected with more people on a
more personal and more emotional level about the full power of running.
THE CHALLENGE
While well-known and respected among hardcore runners, Mizuno is a brand that flies under the radar.
That’s trouble in a category where brands like Nike are among the world’s most popular and others like
Asics and Saucony have deep heritage in the sport. Brand health indices showed that “I’m not very
familiar with the brand” was the single biggest reason runners did not try Mizuno shoes. This problem is
even more pronounced among casual, “weekend warrior” runners and those new to running — two
segments that represent growth opportunities for Mizuno.
We needed to help Mizuno close this gap, but our budget was shoestring (sorry, terrible pun). You cannot
simply drill a brand into someone’s brain on a $1.5 million media buy and 1% category share of voice. So
it wasn’t enough for our work to be noticed — it had to be talked about and shared.
Business Challenge: Drive growth with a mass audience that is not familiar with the brand.
Communications Challenge: With a small budget, make sure runners get to know Mizuno.
Get mainstream runners to see themselves in the brand.
INSIGHT & STRATEGY
You don’t have to be a hardcore runner to know that running has many benefits. Some are physical, like a
slimmer waistline. Some are mental, like improved focus. And some are emotional, such as a brighter
mood.
Most category advertising links to one of these benefits and talks about what running does for the
individual — running makes you happier (Brooks), running gives you strength (Saucony), running helps
you feel accomplished (Asics). There are also many scientific studies that quantify all the good running
does from fighting cancer to strengthening memory. Academics, like advertisers, also frame their
findings in terms of the individual. In magazines, on social media and on running blogs, it’s the same
story: People write about personal experiences as a runner.
It is terrific that people do something for themselves that is healthy and enjoyable, and we had no desire
to challenge that in any way. We needed a way to elevate the connection people felt to running even
further.
With our clients, we enlisted an online panel of runners for immersive weeklong research in search of
deeper motivations. We saw the progression of our participants’ thoughts through collage creation and
journaling. Initially, runners talked about all the familiar benefits — a slimmer body, a sharper mind, a
better mood.
But as they grew more comfortable, runners began sharing why these benefits truly mattered. Stories
emerged about spending an entire run not thinking about pace or distance, but instead focused on
parenting challenges or how to handle a difficult relationship at work. The way runners described it,
running cascades through their lives with wonderfully positive effects.
As one participant wrote in a journaling exercise:
“If I am able to spend time on “Me,” I’m in a better mood. If I’m cranky or stressed, others around me will
feel it or detect it. It’s better for me, my family, for all who are involved in my life, be it personal or
business, [if I run].”
Another put physical fitness in a more meaningful context:
“Running is something I want to grow old with, not only for myself, but to be healthy and around for
other people in my life…I want to be around for my kids when they get older.”
The words “not only for myself” stuck with us, and we realized a simple truth about running that
everyone in the category had either missed or ignored. Running doesn’t just affect individual runners; it
also affects the world around them. Perhaps these same benefits — physical, emotional, mental — were
even more influential than the category had given them credit for.
Planners proposed that it was time for a running brand to introduce a shift to the way we all think about
running. What if we started a conversation about what running does for all of us? It was a chance for
Mizuno to build a connection through the personal impact each runner has on his or her world, and it was
a way to share a powerful truth with a new audience.
Insight:
The world is a better place because we run.
Strategy:
Show how the exact same benefits of running that every other brand touts — physical, emotional, mental
and spiritual health — influences more than the individual runner. Celebrate running’s power to
transform families, neighborhoods, schools, workplaces, communities and even the entire world.
THE BIG IDEA
WHAT IF EVERYBODY RAN?
The creative team wanted to push this strategy as far as possible. If we believe running has the power to
transform the world, they said, let’s imagine a world where everyone was a runner. What would that look
like? With all the studies about the positive effects of running, they wanted to do more than pose a
rhetorical question. They wanted literally to show the effect running could have on all of us.
What If Everybody Ran? is a campaign created to offer a revolutionary point of view on the full power of
running. For every kind of runner, from the most avid to the least experienced, it offers fresh perspective
on the potential of their sport and an opportunity to spread the gospel to others.
Stage 1 was all about proving that running can transform the world.
We commissioned a statistical analysis by graduate students at the University of North Carolina’s KenanFlagler Business School, which Forbes ranks as the 11th best business school in the U.S. The analysis
drew from existing studies on physical, mental, emotional and economic benefits of running and
extrapolated what would happen if they were applied to every person in the in the U.S.
The findings ranged from poignant to lighthearted and fun. On the Mizuno website and on Twitter, we
shared digital info-graphics and posters illustrating the results and encouraging runners to share. We also
created a scrolling site where users could follow a runner through an idyllic world as stats were revealed.
The most impressive part of the response was the range of people who joined the conversation. This
spanned from everyday runners, to health and lifestyle bloggers, doctors, nonprofit organizations and
running specialty stores. Even The New York Times and Huffington Post weighed in with articles. In other
words, we were accomplishing exactly what we had hoped: incorporate Mizuno into a fresh discussion
about running’s potential, and one that included core and casual runners. In fact, the week of the launch
saw the highest volume of traffic ever recorded on the Mizuno website.
Stage 2 was all about doing.
We built a mobile app called the Mizuno Baton, a GPS mileage tracker for smartphones. Runners who
downloaded it had one week to log as many miles as possible to raise money for Back on My Feet, a
nonprofit that works with the homeless to transform their lives through running. Mizuno donated one
dollar for each mile a participant ran. The baton created a way for runners to tangibly help the world and
enticed them to literally run with our brand — a highly impactful way to build familiarity.
The Mizuno Baton is proof that unexpected insight delivered through great creative execution has the
power to move people. And we mean that quite literally in this case: More than 5,000 participants have
combined to run more than 30,000 miles while sharing, tweeting and instagramming all the way. And for
Mizuno, which needed to build familiarity, there is nothing more valuable than having runners spend all
that time with their brand while thinking about the true global effect of running.
For perspective, 30,000+ miles means runners have totaled more than one lap around the world with
Mizuno. It’s rare that consumers give so much on behalf of a brand, but we think we accomplished this by
helping runners think beyond themselves to what is perhaps the most
joyful effect their sport has: Running doesn’t just make you better. It makes the world around you better.