The role of strategic communication in sport events : The challenges of the PR RACE in attracting amateur athletes to distance running events in Romania

Sammanfattning: This year will be the 110th since the first time that athletes ran the exact distance of 42.195 km at the Olympic Games in London, the length known today as the standard distance for a marathon. Since then, the world of distance competitions has gone through remarkable transformations in structure, vision, strategy and location. Attending distance running events is a social global phenomenon, and thousands became hundreds of thousands in terms of participation rate. Starting 1980 the sport communication research experienced an exponential growth due to fast technological changes in sport events organization and promotion channels. The aim of this current research is to study the role of strategic communication in attracting amateur runners to engage in distance races, and the concept of Intelligence-led PR and its functionality during the challenges faced by PR practitioners. The concept is part of strategic communication theory and it has a key role in the communication process due to the significant social and economic impact of these events on the participants’ life and on the local markets. The study will focus on the content and data analysis of two distance running competitions organized in 2016 in Romania. The data collection was made by conducting two interviews with the representatives of the biggest sport event organizers in Romania - Bucharest RUNNING Club Association and Media Production Group, and examining several market reports. The main conclusions of this Master thesis are that research and planning, as well as using modern communication tools and new technologies, as part of strategic communication, have helped the big sport event organizers to reach targeted audiences, form and shape public’s perception about recreational activities and engage people to participate in running competitions. Another finding is that PR Intelligence, as a concept of strategic communication, is represented by a set of knowledge that can be gained both by education and relevant practice and makes this type of communication essential for an organization becoming one of the essential managerial functions.