SPORTS MARKETING

Illustration: Morning Brew Inc, Photos: @chief_preeth, @justinehuang_, @att via Instagram

If you’ve ever walked through a somewhat populated area during the weekend, it’s possible you’ve had the sneaking suspicion that you’re about to be swarmed on the sidewalk: the pounding of sneakers on the concrete, the labored breathing, the flashing lights.

No, it’s not a scene from a horror movie. It’s a run club. And for many brands, they’ve become anything but scary in the months leading up to fall marathon season, which spans races like this weekend’s TCS New York City Marathon.

“If you’re not showing up in a run club, you’re actually probably not doing [marathon sponsorship] right,” Stephanie Arpaia, VP of brand marketing at Excel Sports Management, who works on running strategy for clients including the Hospital for Special Surgery (HSS) and Clif Bar, told Marketing Brew. “That is almost table stakes already, which, to me, is really fascinating. It went from being this underground thing…to very quickly becoming a vital ingredient to a marketer.”

Like with any major sporting event, marathons now tend to draw a roster of official sponsors, in addition to brands seeking to use guerrilla marketing tactics to show up at events without the “official partner” designation. Grassroots marketing has become particularly popular in running, since it’s a heavy participation sport: about 52.3 million people participated in road running in 2025, according to the Outdoor Industry Association.

Given the speed at which run clubs have become valuable brand assets and the continued demand around live sporting events, running stakeholders, including influencers, brands, and race organizers, are still at the starting line of navigating sponsorships. This weekend’s NYC Marathon, though, could serve as an early test for marketers working to navigate the course.

For more on why brands, especially those in the personal care and beauty categories, are embracing run clubs, read more here.—AM

      

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SOCIAL & INFLUENCERS

“Paranormal Activity” on Broadway

It’s rare that a marketer seeks to strike fear in their audience’s heart. But for the folks behind Paranormal Activity on Broadway, there’s no better feeling in the world.

The stage show based on the hit film franchise was recently extended following a successful initial run, and just in time for peak spooky season, too—the show is now running through February 28, 2027. Audiences and critics alike have delivered rave reviews, and even before extension, the play was attracting attendance numbers at near full capacity every week. Box-office revenue has increased nearly every week since previews as well, with a recent week exceeding $1 million in ticket sales, per Broadway World.

Though Paranormal Activity’s creative team certainly deserves its flowers, the show’s marketing team, led by theater marketing agency SpotCo, has been working to support those records. In the run-up to the show’s August opening and throughout its run, the team has used social media to modernize a similar marketing playbook that the franchise’s original film followed.

The show has benefited from considerable word-of-mouth excitement, which Callie Goff, co-managing director and chief creative officer at SpotCo, said the team looked to amplify—even before Paranormal Activity made it to New York City.

One of the biggest challenges for the agency team has been marketing the show to horror and non-horror fans alike. “How do we keep the specificity of what this is, and the excitement of what this is as a true horror property,” Goff explained, “but also [make sure] people know that even if you don’t love horror movies or if you consider yourself a scaredy cat, there’s really something still here for you in this experience?”

For more on Paranormal Activity’s marketing—which, yes, includes night-vision audience reactions—continue reading here.—JN

      

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MARKETING BREW WEEKLY

Horror movie marketing is low budget, high reward, and built off of one tricky problem—getting people hooked without giving the scare away.

In this episode of Marketing Brew Weekly, Jennimai Nguyen, Katie Hicks, and Kelsey Sutton induct five horror movie marketing campaigns into the Horror Movie Hall of Fame. Each one holds a lesson for any marketer, whether you work in entertainment or not.

Some of our takeaways include:

• Build a world, not just an ad. The Blair Witch Project and Longlegs used fake websites and real-world touch points to turn curiosity into word of mouth, which beats a big ad buy.
• Tap the fandom you already have. Backrooms went after a built-in online audience instead of starting from scratch, stoking interest with fan communities that already exist.
• Surprise people where they don’t expect you. Smile planted creepy grins at sports broadcasts and earned about 170 million trackable impressions in a low-risk, high-reward way.
• Make your brand feel real. Obsession turned a $750k budget into $522m worldwide with a real-life prop, a text-me billboard, and a character who lived on Spotify and Letterboxd.

To hear more from the conversation on Marketing Brew Weekly, listen to the full episode here.

      

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WISH WE WROTE THIS

Stories we’re jealous of.

• The Verge wrote about how AI agents are changing the online shopping experience.
• The Atlantic wrote about the undoing of the American Girl doll brand.
• Bloomberg wrote about Hershey’s plans to “win all the holidays.”