• by Chuck Martin , Staff Writer, September 17, 2015

The Internet of Things will impact different people in different ways.

A good example comes from the new announcement that Under Armour is teaming with retailer Sports Authority to link together workout activity and customer loyalty.

Under Armour’s MapMyFitness app, which can track activity from various fitness tracking devices from companies including Fitbit, Jawbone and Garmin, will include regular challenges for its users.

The first challenge issued was to run 10 miles or do three workouts in a week for a chance to win a gift card or points in the Sports Authority loyalty program.

Of course, anyone not using a fitness tracking device won’t be involved, but no matter.

The key is that this program neatly links together the value chain of consumer, wearable device, reward and brand.

All of a sudden, the wearable lives in a larger, connected world with a brand with a physical presence at the end of the road.

Under Armour, which doesn’t make fitness trackers, created the IoT platform that can link wearables and brands, as I wrote about here recently (Under Armour & the Wearables Info Platform).

The value to Sports Authority is that it gets information about activity level that they can link to purchase behavior while Under Armour gets the potential to add to its base of 150 million consumers.

There also are other challenges facilitated by the platform. For example, a Tide challenge of miles and workout levels can win an Under Armour gift card and there are other challenges from BMW and Lean Cuisine.

In the case of Sports Authority, In addition to becoming active participants in the Internet of Things, consumers get rewards in a physical store.

These are the beginning and small examples of IoT-based marketing.