#RunYourTown

May 13, 2014

The Bellin Run wants you to run your town and use the hashtag #RunYourTown. Organizers of the annual 10K event have kicked off a social media campaign to encourage area runners and walkers to use social media channels to share their experiences and engage in discussions.

“In 2013, we had 20,000 people that chose to be a part of our event,” said Dana Bzdawka, who leads the Bellin Run marketing efforts. “Social media provides many benefits to an event of this size, including enhanced two-way communication and real-time feedback. Better communication means a better event.”

Social media is also helping participants identify and make a stronger connection with the event.

“For many participants, the run is a significant milestone in their fitness journey – whether it’s their first time running 6.2 miles, they are striving to best a previous time, or this is an annual family event,” said Bzdawka. “Social media allows them the opportunity to share their experience with their friends and family. This, in turn, furthers Bellin’s efforts to encourage health and fitness.”

The Bellin Run has Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube accounts – all under the @BellinRun name. Organizers are encouraging the use of the hashtag #RunYourTown on these sites.

“Hashtags have grown in popularity, so we conducted research to determine a unique phrase that would resonate with runners,” said Bzdawka. “The hashtag #RunYourTown is a call to action, a clever play on words, and it also connects people with their community and the largest running event in the area – the Bellin Run.”

Hashtags are used within social media channels (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and others) to create a unique identifier associated with a topic. A hashtag is a word, phrase or set of characters that begins with the # symbol and is included with a social media post to “tag” a topic. One or several hashtags can be used.

(Example: John Smith: Just finished a 3-mile training run. #BellinRun #RunYourTown)

Users can then utilize a social media channel’s search function to find posts that have been tagged with that hashtag. The primary benefit of hashtag use is it allows social media users to follow a conversation beyond their social network of friends and followers. Instead, all posts within that channel (hashtags do not cross social media platforms) are revealed.

If you are a social media user, connect with @BellinRun on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube and tag your posts with #RunYourTown.