The Challenge

With the successful launch of FRED and the public-facing NYRR site, for the first time in the organization’s history, customer data from different platforms was flowing into a centralized database. The next challenge became – how do we modernize systems to align with the different personas that interact with the organization?

Together, we worked on understanding the different customer journeys so that we could build personalized, meaningful experiences for runners across the globe.

The Approach

Within the running community, there’s a variety of personas - the active runner, the marathon-only runner, the family runner, etc. And, each person goes through a unique ‘runner journey’ – from training for races to entering the drawing for the marathon, for example.

With the ability to now bring in data points from FRED – transactions, race history, and different touchpoints for individual members – our new task became developing a way to harness the data and start iteratively infusing personalization points into digital experiences.

Through whiteboarding sessions our team began mapping out the different journeys runners go through. In parallel, we started conceptualizing how we can leverage technology to create 1:1 customer experiences.

The Solution

With this new initiative, we knew NYRR would need more than a traditional content management system - they needed a Digital Experience Manager that could integrate with the organization’s pre-existing systems.

Enabling a 1:1 relationship with the member was the end goal. Together, we defined Sitecore as the platform of choice that could connect the dots from events, to volunteers, to FRED, to real time race tracking, delivering true personalized experiences.