Marketer's Corner: NordicTrack In With The New

Dang, I'd like an apartment like that. P.C. Digital Trends

---

Am I the only one who confused a NordicTrack commercial for a Peloton commercial? During Olympic season, I swear I saw 20 NordicTrack commercials. I initially understood NordicTrack to be an old, outdated piece of exercise equipment. According to Wikipedia, it was founded in 1975 in Minnesota. So, how does a nearly 50-year-old exercise equipment company stay relevant in an age dominated by generations X, Y, Z?

Let's go back to 1998 when Utah-based Icon Health and Fitness (now known as ICON Fitness) acquired NordicTrack. The company– well, its parent company CML Corporation– filed for bankruptcy and was fortunately picked up by Icon. If not for this acquisition, NordicTrack may well have gone extinct. Under ICON, NordicTrack experienced huge success, particularly with its treadmills.

ICON's technological prowess, aided by state of the art SmartFitness technology, allowed NordicTrack to offer a personalized workout regimen to its users. The technology takes in user feedback and outputs different recommendations based on user preferences. At CES 2019, NordicTrack debuted a VR bike, integrating a virtual reality headset with specially designed "gaming" handlebars in order to gamify the workout. Talk about next level!

Per Media Radar, ICON spent under $100M on NordicTrack advertisements (digital, print, and TV) in the past year. This included premium ad units on over 250 media properties. No wonder their ads were everywhere. NordicTrack has a great quality product. You could have a quality product yet still flounder without strong brand recognition. NordicTrack recognized this and upped their marketing strategy big time.

I'm looking forward to seeing more new ads from NordicTrack in the next couple months.