Garmin Marketing – a new angle in the company’s marketing as it revisits its Club on Strava

Garmin recently erased its content from its Strava club presence, seemingly restarting the Club. All its old posts have been deleted and replaced with new informational content on Training Status, regurgitated from another of Garmin’s marketing channels.

Join Garmin’s Strava club here.

The Club has an impressive 278,336 members at the time of writing, somewhat short of the 5,926,723 Strava boasts from its member roster but significantly ahead of the ever-popular GCN, which has 138,509 members.

But Why is Garmin Relaunching This Now?

Strava might be experiencing a resurgence in growth that Garmin wants to tap into, or Garmin might have a new Head of Marketing who just happens to like Strava. Or something in between. Who knows?

Whatever the real reason, a Strava Club is a good way for clubs to communicate with members to

• Message group members or the entire groups

• Share Activities and Routes

• Compete and check progress with peers on the Leaderboards

With those attributes, I’m not entirely sure this is a meaningful way for a large company to engage globally. Most of the benefits are irrelevant on a global scale – Garmin’s Strava club is ostensibly based in Wisconsin; if I join, what is the point of them sharing a Wisconsin route with me? OK, the leaderboards might have some meaning but besides my bike computer, what do I have in common with all the other members, and why would I want to compete with them? Clubs might be a good way for Garmin to re-hash its content from different media channels, which involves little effort but will probably get little benefit.

It’s also worth noting that Garmin has regional Twitter/X accounts, including its global one. This illustrates how a more regional or country-based approach with Strava Clubs might be a better way to foster genuine engagement. Perhaps Garmin could sponsor your local Strava Club in some way – offer a free Edge in exchange for your club being rebranded on Strava to include the ‘Garmin’ word.

What do you think?