Promoting Active Living

Recreation’s Role in Active Living

The recreation sector is essential in encouraging and promoting active living behaviours. As part of our goal to support overall community health and wellness, active living behaviours are crucial in getting the highest benefit from healthy eating⁽¹⁾.

As a sector, we can support active living through the following:

Spaces, facilities, and staff to house and run recreation and sport programming and interventions
Increasing access to recreation opportunities through parks and green spaces
Promoting and modelling an active lifestyle

Applying the 4Ps to Active Living

Look through the examples and tips to use the 4Ps to make your active living program stand out! Remember, you should always adapt and tailor messaging and promotions to what your target audience values.

Looking to learn more about the people in your community?

Visit the People Pillar of the Healthy Communities Framework to learn how you can best understand your community and/or target audience(s) so that your messaging and program(s) stands out!

People Pillar

HINT: Refer back to what you learned about your audience in Step 2 of Developing a Promotional Plan to help you: 1) Identify where and how your audience accesses products and information; and 2) Determine where to place promotions for your product.

Step 2: Get to Know Your Community

Make Your Product Stand Out

To make your active living program or event stand out, it’s important to:

Know what kind of Active Living program or event you want to implement. With your team and community, complete an asset map and determine the community’s values and priorities to guide what product to provide.
Understand the environmental context you’ll deliver your program. With your team and community, complete a strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats (SWOT) analysis to determine product changes and opportunities to capitalize on.

Once you and your team have decided on the type of program or event and understand the environmental context, use the tips below to make your active living program stand out!⁽²⁾

Consider how to make your active living program or event unique by:

Tailoring it to be culturally relevant (i.e. traditional Indigenous hunting programs, women’s only exercise classes for Muslim women)
Providing multiple benefits through the program or event, such as:
- Building physical literacy (the development of necessary skills, confidence, and passion for movement to be physically active for life)⁽²⁾
- Increasing knowledge and awareness of the importance of physical activity
- Creating a positive experience by participating in and mastering recreation activities and sports⁽³⁾
- Creating community belonging⁽³⁾
Reducing barriers to being active (i.e. lowering costs of recreation opportunities, increasing access to equipment, or building healthy places that facilitate active living)

Make Your Price Competitive

Many factors influence Price including such as overhead costs, required profitability, and maximum price consumers can and are willing to pay. With your team, consider how to increase participation in your Active Living program or event through Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI). Check out the tips below:

With your team, consider how to increase participation in your Active Living program or event through Equity, Diversity and inclusion (EDI):

Offer a sliding scale fees
Leverage partnerships to reduce costs (i.e. partnering with sports equipment stores to get discounted or donated sports/ recreational equipment)
Provide additional services to reduce cost barriers (i.e. providing programming or child care for the children of participating adults)
Partner with agencies or oragnizations to offer discounts to participants (i.e. free or reduced bike repairs to children and youth who participate in a summer biking program)
Seek funding from grants, donors or other funding options to offset program costs

Check out our other resources on:

Optimizing Product & Promotion Placement

A) Where to place your product:

Whether a product or promotion, the best placement is where your target audience will see it. Start by understanding your audience: Where and how does your audience access products and information?

Consider the context of Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (EDI) in where you host the active living program or event. Increase accessibility by choosing locations that have:

Accessibility infrastructure (i.e. ramps, wheelchair accommodations, visual markers for people with limited eyesight, etc.)
Public transportation access
Services such as child-care or food retailers nearby

If your program is virtual, consider how to address virtual accessibility by:

Increasing digital literacy of the participants. (i.e. provide simple how-to steps for how to navigate and log onto platforms)
Providing alternatives for those with limited internet connection and speed
Choosing platforms and websites that are user-friendly and easy to navigate

B) Where to promote your product:

Where does your audience access information? Use what you learned about your target audience in Step 2 of Developing a Promotional Plan to guide where to place promotions for your active living programs and events. Does your target audience:

Use social media? If so, which platform(s)?
Prefer email? Phone calls? Flyers? Word of mouth?
Access community or municipality information webpages?
Regularly visit or frequent certain locations around your community?

Place promotions where they are most likely to be seen (i.e. most used social media platforms, frequented locations, etc.)
Place physical promotions near eye-level where they are easily viewed
Choose eye-catching graphics/design, and font that is easy to read
Place physical promotions in high-traffic areas
Post online promotions at peak activity times
For word of mouth or verbal promotions, choose locations and times the target audience will be available. (i.e. calling parents later in the evenings after children are in bed)

C) Consider using these online platforms to help you get started!

Online graphic design tool for social media posts, flyers, presentations, and more. Free and paid accounts available at canva.com.

Free online service that shortens links. Primarily used to create short links for social media posts. Available at bitly.com.

Paid social media management software to help users create engaging content and increase followers. Available at hootsuite.com.

Online survey software. It can be used for registration, placing online orders, evaluation, and more! Free with a Google account. Available at google.ca/forms/about.

Online professional email service.

Free and paid accounts available at mailchimp.com.

Online events management tool. Free or paid, depending on event entrance fees and nonprofit status. Available at eventbrite.ca.

Free professional stock photos.

Available at unsplash.com.

Free professional stock photos.

Available at pexels.com.

Key Considerations

Indirect Communications & Influencers

Indirect communications are when organizations aim their messages at the people who influence the target audience. Using indirect messaging and influencers are especially helpful if you are trying to reach children and youth⁽⁴⁾.

If your target audience benefits from indirect communications, think about where to promote your healthy food options or healthy eating program where it will reach your influencers.

Boosting Your Promotions

romotion refers to the communication portion of your plan. With your team, answer:

What is the goal of your communications?
Who do you want to communicate with?
What is your core message?

Once you’ve answered these questions, use the following tips to make your product stand out:

To communicate and promote your healthy eating program or event, create promotions that use:

Repetition
Persuasive messaging
Mood and tone
Sticky messages
Stories
Plain Language

For example:

Share a program or event testimonial story of a staff member, volunteer or participant in your newsletter, social media and the local newspaper
Distribute advertisements, fliers and posters that include positive images and highlight the benefits of the program or event
Share a video of your program or event featuring an endorsement from a leader that the target audience respects
Share the call to action (i.e. a registration form) with teasers about the program or event or memorable catch-phrases on social media, online and through radio
Create and share a healthy eating challenge with your community through social media

Key Considerations

Make the most of your promotions by aligning them with the Government of Canada’s Calendar of Health Promotion Days⁽⁵⁾. Join in on social awareness campaigns, policy windows or recognition months or days to boost the reach of your promotions.

Need help with developing a promotional plan?

Visit the Promotions Pillar homepage of the Healthy Communities Framework to learn the definitions of marketing and the five steps to developing a promotional plan!

Promotions Pillar

Further Your Learning

Check out these resources for more examples and tools to promote Active Living in your community!

Continue Exploring Promotions

Promotions – Home

Canadian Parks and Recreation Association/Interprovincial Sport and Recreation Council. A Framework for Recreation in Canada 2015 Pathways to Wellbeing. [report on internet]. The Association; 2015 [cited 2022 October 22]. Available from: https://cpra.ca/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/FrameworkForRecreationInCanada_2016wcitation.pdf
Active for Life. [Internet]. What is Physical Literacy; 2022c [cited 2022 October 22]. Available from: https://activeforlife.com/physical-literacy-2/
High Five. [Internet]. Studies & Reserach; n.d. [cited 2022 October 22] Available from: https://www.highfive.org/what-high-five/studies-research
Community Tool Box [Internet]. Section 1. Developing a Plan for Communication; 2022c [cited 2023 January 14]. Available from: https://ctb.ku.edu/en/table-of-contents/participation/promoting-interest/communication-plan/main
Government of Canada [Internet]. Calendar of health promotion days; January 2023 [cited 2023 January 14]. Available from: https://www.canada.ca/en/health-canada/services/calendar-health-promotion-days.html
Government of Alberta & Alberta Health Services [Internet]. Healthier Together: Physical Activity Messaging Toolkit; 2018c [cited 2023 January 14]. Available from: https://www.healthiertogether.ca/living-healthy/be-active/physical-activity-messaging-toolkit/
National Recreation and Parks Association. Communications Toolkit: Attracting Families to Your Youth Sports Programs [report on internet]. The Association; 2021 [cited 2023 January 14]. Available from: https://www.nrpa.org/siteassets/youth_sports_communications_toolkit.pdf

Recreation’s Role in Active Living

Applying the 4Ps to Active Living