How Yoga Brands can work with Endurance Sports Influencers

The COVID-19 pandemic has brought struggle for many throughout the world including a strong effect on athletes’ ability to stay active. However, throughout our community at Freestak we have seen an expansion of creativity and desire to get involved with new activities, including the practice of yoga.

As a result, we are expanding our network into the yoga space and welcome all yoga brands looking to get involved with motivated influencers.

Recently, we conducted an online survey among our most active members – all of whom are influencers in the outdoor and endurance sports sectors who practice yoga. We asked about their yoga habits, why they practice and how interested they were in yoga partnerships.

The research and data shows the correlation between endurance sports and yoga and how effectively the two can balance one another throughout the influencer marketing industry.

Yoga as a supplement to endurance sports

Our research found that 68% of our respondents practice yoga on a daily or weekly basis in addition to their primary sport, while an additional 19% are looking to start more.

In order to incorporate yoga more into their daily routines, endurance sports influencers would like to help more yoga brands show how yoga can supplement their sports training.

“There are some great yoga influencers, but a lack of mixed athletes doing yoga and saying how it benefits them. It’s helping me so much at the moment and I would like to start sharing more,” Freestak influencer, @fitforadventure_, said.

Most notably used by athletes to improve flexibility and mobility, influencers also want to show their audiences how yoga can be practiced to prevent injuries, recover from a long run and improve strength.

Yoga for beginners

Of our respondents, 97% are beginner or intermediate yoga practitioners and have expressed a desire to see more basic training and advice throughout the yoga space.

Influencers want to share how yoga can be for everybody and shed the intimidating facade of yoga as an “expert only” practice. With more content showing basic movements and guidance on the most effective kit or equipment, influencers hope to show the benefits of yoga on a more introductory level.

“Not everyone is yoga perfect and I think I can help put this across in my platform through showing how you don’t need to be the traditional yogi,” Freestak influencer, @runningdutchie, said.

Advanced movements and picture perfect poses are not what yoga means for Freestak influencers. They expressed the need for more authenticity throughout the yoga community and want to show audiences real, everyday content they can benefit from.

Bringing yoga to Freestak

As influencers on the Freestak platform become more involved in practicing yoga, a desire to collaborate with yoga brands has been reported. Of our respondents, 77% said they would like to be sponsored by a yoga brand, while 80% would like more yoga brands and campaign opportunities on the platform.

“During this pandemic there’s a much bigger focus on yoga. Great opportunity to capture a big target audience. More than happy and willing to help out should any yoga campaigns arise,” Freestak influencer, @justalilbester, said.

Endurance sports influencers would like to utilize these collaborations in order to test new yoga products, work with new brands and share advice with followers on the benefits of yoga as a supplement to training.

They also expressed how a brand partnership would increase their desire to practice more and create more content. While endurance influencer’s feeds include yoga related content, the saturation is limited. However, 90% said they plan to or are considering adding more to their social feeds, with even more stating that they’d increase yoga content if there were more collaboration opportunities.

Key Takeaways

• Yoga brands have the opportunity to reach more beginners and intermediate yogis who may not know the benefits of the practice as a supplement to endurance sports.
• Endurance sports athletes are already practicing yoga with the vast majority expressing interest in yoga brand collaborations.
• Endurance influencers’ limited existing yoga brand partnerships leaves brands with a wider pool of motivated, quality influencers to work with.

According to a study from The Edinburgh Clinic, Scotland, examining the benefits of including yoga into an athlete’s training programme, results found that 95.5% felt that yoga was important to consider as part of athletic training and 100% would recommend yoga to other athletes.

By linking yoga with endurance sports, yoga brands can help spread the benefits of combining the practice with sports and work with influencers who can provide instruction, gear advice and equipment suggestions to a wider audience.

For more information on how Freestak can help with your influencer marketing campaigns, please contact our CEO, Simon Freeman, at simon@freestak.com.

To view the full yoga brands report, click here.