These slides were presented by Bob Bickel at Race Director University in May, 2012. They are an overview of the types of ways race directors can use online registration. More information at www.RunSignUp.com

1. Online Registration
How to Grow Your Race
While Making Life Simpler…
Bob Bickel – bob.bickel@runsignup.com
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2. Online Registration – Some Facts
• 13 Million + people used online registration to signup for
races in 2011.
• Large races (>2-5,000) have gone to online registration
exclusively
• Many are bundling processing cost into race fee
• There are about 100 different options for race directors to do
online registration with.
• Active.com was the first in 1999 and continues to dominate in
terms of volume
• Processing fees
• Active.com - $3.25 minimum or $1.25 + 6.75%
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3. Agenda
• Benefits of Online Registration
• Basic Features of Online Registration
• Advanced Features of Online Registration
• Promotional Tools
• Reporting
• Emerging Technology and Trends of Online Registration
• Mobile
• Your Web Presence
• Social Networking
• Online Registration Options
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4. Online Registration - Benefits
• Data Entry is higher quality and lower
cost for the race
• Collections is simpler
• More powerful Reporting
• Marketing
• Google Search
• Race Calendars
(RunningintheUSA.com, etc.)
• Facebook & Social Networking
• Collecting emails for next year
• Donations
• Communicating with Runners
• Easier for Runners 4

5. Basic Online Registration
• Race Information WebPage
• Race Name
• Location (map)
• Date & Time
• Events
• Costs
• Registration open & close times
• Link to Paper Registration
• Description
• Other Important information –
prizes, sponsors, training
programs, fundraising 5
• Social Media Links

6. Sign Up Page
• Runner Information
• Do you really need things like
phone number, address? Is date
of birth required?
• Multiple Registrants in the same
transaction
• Waiver
• Right to agree to Waiver
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7. Sign Up - Checkout
• Confirm Runner Information
• Processing Fees
• Which Credit Cards are accepted
• Simple data input
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8. Sign Up Confirmation
• Confirmation Page
• Runner Information
• Directions
• Clear Transaction
• Saves time – about 7 in 1,000
transactions have mistakes and
the runner clears and re-signs up.
• Email confirmation including all
information about race, runner
and directions.
• Re-Confirmation 8

9. ADVANCED FEATURES 9

10. Donations
• Ask all runners on checkout for
donations
• Create separate Donation Page
• Set Goals
• Thank Donors
• Allow Anonymous!
• Multiple Charities
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11. FundRaisers
• Individual FundRaisers
• Team FundRaisers
• Fundraiser pages
• Allow donors to specify a
Fundraiser
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12. Give Aways
• What kind of Give Away
• Multiple Sizes
• Additional price
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13. Age Based Pricing
• Attract new age groups to
your race
• Set specific dates for special
pricing
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14. Group Pricing
• Set Date Range for Sign up
• For groups signing up
together
• Minimum and maximum
number of registrants
• Discount per runner or fixed
price, or single group price
• Useful for “Family Price”
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15. Discounts
• USATF is most common
discount – They have a
standard $2 discount for
members signing up for
USATF certified races.
• Other use cases –
Fire, Police, EMS discount.
Military discount.
• Visible to all runners.
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16. Coupons
• Coupons refer to a “secret”
code that a runner enters
on the Checkout Page.
• % and/or $
• Start and end dates
• Options like minimum cart
value, limit # of uses, new
customers only.
• Useful for Elite athletes,
sponsors, running clubs,
etc. 16

17. Sign Up – Custom Questions
• Give Away Items & Size
• Emergency Contact info
• How you heard about the race
• Expected finish time
• etc…
• You want easy data input – option
menus, multi-select, etc. Avoid
free text answers since it is hard
to correlate the data.
• The more questions you ask, the
more annoying it is to runners.
They will provide less and less 17
accurate answers.

18. Custom Questions
• Formatting your Questions • What users see
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19. Race Info Page Custom Info
• Include all the information
your runners will need:
• Place (make sure Google
Maps recognizes this!)
• Time
• Prizes
• Age Groups
• Amenities on race day
• Parking suggestions
• Sponsors
• Useful links
• Email contact
• Beneficiaries
• Race Course
• Course Records
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• Etc.

20. Participant Display
• Who can see what
Participant Information
• Other Participants
• Public
• Timer
• How much info to share?
• Race results contain name
and city and age.
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21. Teams
• Adds a fun element to your
race
• Runner-managed or Race
Director managed
• Corporate Challenge
• Relays
• Parameters
• Min & Max # per team
• Male/Female/Co-ed
• Age Groups
• Single event or across 21
events

22. Runner Team View
• Teams should be runner-
managed
• Join existing teams
• Checked by the system to
meet requirements of age
and/or sex.
• Create a Team
• First person becomes the
Captain
• Captain can edit members
• Race Director can assign 22
Captains

23. Store
• Add-on sales
• Pasta Dinner
• Logo Gear –
Jackets, Hats, Socks, etc.
• Set Ordering Dates
• Only fulfill firm orders?
• Estimate volume and pre-
order
• Let’s you sell closer to the
event and at the event
• Put a Date on or not?
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24. Your Own Website
• Options for Creating
• Design firms
• Content Management Tools from Web Hosters like GoDaddy
• Wordpress, Drupal, Joomla
• Sites.RunSignUp.com – in Beta
• Embedding your Registration on your Website
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25. PROMOTIONAL TOOLS 25

26. Promotional Tools - Search
• Previously Discussed
• Coupons, Discounts, Age-Group Pricing, Teams, etc.
• Web Searches
• #1 source of web traffic
• Make sure your webpage gets indexed by Google
• Race Name appears in URL
• Town appears in URL
• Page Title – What appears in the Browser Tab
• Advice – Keep the same name year to year.
• Do Not do “27th Annual Scott Coffee Moorestown Rotary 8K”
• Find places to link to your race – links matter
• RunningInTheUSA.com
• roadraceplace.com
• Rrca.com
• http://www.findarace.org/
• RunnersWorld.com
• coolrunning.com
• RaceCenter.com
• http://www.theschedule.com/ 26
• roadraceplace.com
• Local calendards like http://www.houstonrunningcalendar.com/

27. Email Marketing
• Drive registration with your previous participants
• 3 Month, 6 Week, 2 Week, Final Days Emails
• Encourage bringing friends & family
• Use a real Email Marketing System
• Constant Contact or iContact as examples
• Some Online Registration has connections for real email
marketing
• Buying Lists
• Active.com (http://www.activecampaign.com/), Rodale (Runners
World, Running Times -
http://www.rodaleinc.com/content/advertising)
• Trading lists with other Race Directors 27
• Timers and Race Management companies

28. REPORTING 28

29. Reporting
• Participant Information to
Timers
• CSV
• RunScore, Race
Director, Chronotrack API’s
• Analysis
• Giveaways
• Age
• State, City
• Registration Period
• Time of Day
• Day of Week 29
• Etc.

30. 30

31. New Areas of OnLine Registration
• Facebook
• Mobile
• Kiosks on Race Day
• Timer & Race Director
Access to Participants
• Result Integration
• Results Notification
• Bib Exchange
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32. Participant Management
• Switching Runners from one event to another
• Allowing Runners to exchange bibs
• Ensuring new runner agrees to waiver and inputs data correctly
• Free Exchange – “gift” from first to second runner
• Paid Exchange
• New runner signs up as normal
• Old runner receives Refund when New Runner signs up
• Refunds
• Refund Fees
• Minimizing risk of loss
• X spots, Cut-off date
• Insurance – 365 Competitors 32
• Race Director only or opening up to runners to self-serve refunds

33. Waiting List
• Enables a Refund Policy – as runners get refunds, they are replaced by
people on the Waiting List.
• Open up Additional Slots
• Configuration Choices
• First Come, First Served vs. Lottery
• Date for Open Waiting List registration
• As soon as race cap is met
• After Opening day
• Date for Additional Slot Notifications – eg. Add 1,000 runners form the
Waiting List
• Deadline for Runners to accept Waiting List Spots (1 Day? 1 Week?)
• Maximum number of spots a runner can sign up for
• Number of spots to open
• Reserved Entries – inviting specific runners even if race is at or above
cap. 33

34. Cloud - Scalability
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35. OnLine Registration Options
• www.Active.com
• www.RunTheDay.com
• www.RunSignUp.com
• www.RunningintheUSA.com/Race/OnlineRegAbout.aspx
• http://www.rrca.org/services/online-services/ - Race Events
and Club Membership
• www.RaceIt.com
• http://www.pretzelcitysports.com/online_readmefirst.html
• http://www.signmeup.com/
• https://www.eventbrite.com/
• http://www.acteva.com/ 35
• And many, many more…

36. Common Features
For Runners
Simple Registration No distractions - quick and simple signup
Facebook Login No extra login information to remember, and reduces the amount of data input.
No need to create
account Simplifies the registration process
Signup Multiple people in
a single transaction Drastically lowers cost of processign fees for runners and saves on data entry and time.
If enabled, can create or
join teams
If enabled, can create
their own fundraising
page
Post to Facebook Wall or
Twitter Makes it easy to share and invite friends.
Gives runners the ability to cancel their registration if they made a mistake and get a refund
15 minutes to Cancel and then try again. This greatly reduces errors that race directors usually have to get involved
Registration in resolving.
Email Confirmation with We send a full confirmation email that includes all of the runner information, the rce
Directions! information as well as a nice google map with directions from their home to the rce location.
Low Transaction Fee Save money
No Advertising Keeps the runner focused on what they came to do - signup for your race.
We send one email when the runner registers, and will never send another email to them, or
No Spam share their information with any third party.
We use a very secure method with a combination of SSL and redirect technology so that only 36
our processing company sees the credit card number (it actually never passes thru our
Secure Transaction systems). This gives us full PCI compliance.
Any Credit Card VISA, MasterCard, American Express, Discover. Let the runners signup with the card they want.

37. Common Features
Free Web Page
This allows you to add content to your race information page. It can be anything - perhaps Awards,
Custom Sections listing sponsors, Background information on the race, etc.
You publish runner information in the results. Some races are starting to display who has signed up for
Display a race. Chose who can see this information (everyone, only others who have registered), and chose
Participants how much information to display.
SignUp Buttons that you can cut and paste into other websites or emails to direct them to your race
Link Buttons webpage, donation page or online store.
Embed Race Information, Registration, Donation, and Online Store right into your own website. See
Widget http://www.moorestownxc.org/mdrc/TurkeyTrot.html for an example.
Donations
Donations Accept donations. This will ask each runner who registers if they want to make a donation.
A donation webpage (and widget that you can insert into your race website) is created that anyone
Donation webpage can be directed to.
Donation Levels Set your own donation levels. For example Gold is $100 and Silver is $25.
Donation Goals Set goals for your donations - display a thermometer to show progress toward your goal.
Donor Scrolling
List Displays a scrolling list of donors
Anonymous
Donations Donors can make their gift anonymous, or can specify who their donation is in honor of.
Allows Runners to set up their own fundraising page. Other runners can then chose to donate to
Runner their friends and family. Runners can set their own donation goals and display a thermometer and
Fundraising scolling list of donors. 37
Groups of runners can form teams and fundraise as a group and get their own custom webpage.
Team Fundraising Teams can set their own donation goals and display a thermometer and scolling list of donors.

38. Common Features
Easy Setup
Chose whether to require runners to give their phone number (will you ever use it, and leaving it
Phone Number Option out makes the signup process easier!)
PDF Registration Form You can upload a PDF form to allow runners to register by mail.
Automatic email with full confirmation of runner information, race information and a Google
Registration Email to Runners Map with directions from the runners home address to the race address is sent
In addition to the standard information from RunSignUp that gets emailed to runners signing up,
Customize Email to Runners you can also customize and add your own message to each email.
Same URL year after year When you renew a race, we use the same exact URL
If you have different paper registration forms for each event, we support you uploading them all.
Multiple PDF forms for each We want to make things easy for you and the runners, and if their preference is paper rather
event than online, that is fine with us. Whatever makes them happy!
Runners can register with their Facebook login. This makes it simple for runners since they do
not have to remember another login and it reduces the amount of informaiton they need to type
Facebook Login in.
We allow runners to register right inside Facebook - no coming to a different website. This
Facebook Registration increases the
Date of Birth Option Chose whether to require Date of Birth or not.
Administration
Edit participant This is convenient for when a runner enters wrong informationa nd sends a follow-up email
Information asking to have their age corrected for example.
Helps you manage registration for those who have cancelled. Note race directors are
Remove Participant responsible for refunds, not RunSignUp. 38
Easily manage multiple races and see quickview reports that show participants this year
Track Multiple Races compared to last year.
Add Paper Entries Free Upload or input of paper entries into a single database.

39. Common Features
Pricing
Multiple Registration Set different pricing for each period. For example $20 before April 1, $25 before June 1 and $30
Periods before race day
Set pricing for specific age ranges. For example runners under 18 or over 65 might get a
Age-based Pricing different price.
Allow custom pricing This allows for charging for "upgraded" give-aways. For example an XXL shirt, or perhaps a Tech
for give-aways T-Shirt rather than a cotton T-Shirt.
Processing Fee
Flexibility Set the runner, ther ace or the runner and race split the processing fee 50-50.
Teams
Teams Fully supports teams for races.
Runners create Runners can create their own teams. Other runners can then join the team. Allows for full
Teams runner management. Each runner can pay their own fee for participation.
Runners can see which teams are available to signup for and join those teams. Captains are
Runners signup for notified each time a new member joins the team and has the ability to accpet or not accept that
teams person on the team.
Set up team requirements. For example all Male or all female teams or co-ed teams. Or age
based teams like 10 and under. Also set up the minimum and maximum number of people on a
team - so a relay might require a minimum of 4 or 12, while a corporate challenge might limit
Team Requirements the number to 5 or 7 or 25 runners per team.
Volunteers 39
Free Volunteer
SignUp Allow multiple Volunteer categories and free signup with no processing fee

40. Common Features
Reporting
Registration Email to
Race Director Chose whether you want an email each time someone registers.
Set specific people to have access to participant information. This is very useful for timing
services so they can have real-time access to participant information and can download the
Timing Service Access to data themselves rather than the race director having to download and email. It can also be
Participants useful when there are multiple race directors.
You can enter other runners either on a special web page, or upload a CSV (Excel) file. This
allows race directors to input their paper registrations so all information is in one place and
Import runners for free eases reporting. There is no charge for this.
Participant Search Full search capability for participants.
Chose which fields to show. Do sorting by just clicking on a column in the table showing
Participant Reports participants.
Registration Period See how many runners signed up during early bird, pre-registration and post-registration in
Report graphical and table format.
Day of Week, Time of Day
Reporting See when runners are signing up for your race.
Participant City and State
Report See where your runners are coming from to run your race.
See who is coming to your race by age group as well as male/female. Graphical and table
Gender and Age Reports formats.
See how many of each size shirt has been selected. This can help tremendously with figuring
Giveaway Reports out what quantities to order.
Track registration, donation and store revenue. Track payments. Table and graphical
Financial Reports reporting.
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41. Common Features
Marketing Your
Race
Email Marketing Integration with leading Email marketing software to easily mail participants.
When you create your race, we can automatically create a Facebook Event. This makes
Facebook Race Event it easy to connect with younger runners and take advantage of social networking.
Facebook Like Simple Facebook Like button on your race webpage.
Comments on your Facebook Event will also display on the Race Info page as well. This
Facebook Newsstream helps get the message about your race out as widely as possible.
Coupons Set up coupons for special discounts.
Set $ and/or % Coupons Set any combination of % off and/or $ off. For example, it could be $5 off plus 20% off.
Set date range for Enable coupons over any date range. Set one coupon for early birds and one for later
Coupons that is not as large for example.
Set Coupon Limits on use Limit the use of coupons to a quanity (for example first 10 runners, or limit a sponsor to
or user type 20 free passes), to # of times a customer can use it, etc.
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42. Common Features
Advanced
Features
Allows you to keep registration open right up until the last minute. For example, leave
Set specific time for registration open until 7:00PM the night before the race to minimize the number of
registration to end race day registrations.
Allows for as many events as you want for your race. For example a 5K, a 10K and a
Multi-Events per Race Fun Run. Set pricing for each.
Give Away Pricing
Options Charge extra just for XXL shirts, or for any premium options
Give Away - Unlimited
options You can set anything to specify the options. S - M - L, or Red - Green, etc.
Customize Give Away T-Shirts, Hats, Water bottles, whatever you want to specify to your runners.
Default Waiver Used by many races, or you can customize and edit your own waiver.
Upload Logo You can upload your own logo to appear on the race webpages
Easily create a race series with the "Copy Race" button. This creates a complete copy
of all of the information in a race, then just go in and set a new date. For example a
Race Series - Copy Races summer series with weekly races every Wednesday night.
Simplifies listing the race next year. Just click a button and modify the date and your
Renew Race race is ready to register runners for the following year..
Maximum # of
Participants Set the maximum number of participants for your race.
Want to ask your runners custom questions? We have seen races use this for a variety
of things. For example, "How many years have you run in this race?", or "How many
miles per week do you train?", or "Emergency Contact", etc. Create as many questions
Custom Questions as you like. Also you can set whetehr each runner is required to answer or not.
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Multiple race directors can have access to setting up the information for the race
Multiple Race Directors webpages as well as all reports and participant information.