12/13/2009

Social Web Running. . .

Literally that, Running. Staying true to the more entertaining weekend blogs, and to share a bit about myself besides my professional pursuits, I wanted to write about running. . . via social media. I've been a big running for about 10 years now with 8 marathons under my belt and hopefully plenty more to follow. My last was the 5th of December, a trail marathon in Indiana – check out this elevation profile! Lots of fun ;-)

I first thought about putting a top 5 or 10 list together but quickly realized I should leave that to Carol and her Top running websites list or the Healthcare Administration Degree's 100 list. Thanks for the thorough lists, folks!

Then, I thought about a site I used with some frequency before, Athletic Minded Traveler . . . but then I found out they went to a pay-for-service model since I last used them. As a traveling consultant, I found it to be a valuable resource when it was free. . . $20 a year now, but I don't have a need. So I moved on. . . .

For a community to gain serious momentum, it might just need to be on Facebook these days, right? Well I went looking and quickly found:

So, if you are looking to become mayor of something that could be major, try aggregating the online running community. . . somewhere (for when they aren't out running, I suppose) There is Runners Lounge, but, and this is possibly horrible to say, can any social site be legitimate without use of Facebook Connect?

I did happen upon traineo, an awesome site for someone who is looking to get seriously motivated about weight loss and fitness. Watch the quick 1:41 min video to understand. Basically, you set up goals, they use analytics to guide and motivate you. But, most importantly, you join in on a community of motivators who all help each other – that's huge. A resource like this should be used in any/all preventative health programs! I wrote about this back in June. FYI, fitlink has a similar model.

traineo in under 2 mins from traineo on Vimeo.

So there you go. . . I have not been missing too much online while I've been out running ;-) BTW, Today's run along the lake was amazing!

Did I miss any amazing online running gems that you know of?

UPDATE:  Want to give mention to Weight Loss Buddy at http://tinyurl.com/ybkqpcj with features similar to traineo.  And, it appears the site is halfway to perfection.  They are on Twitter, Facebook, and MySpace. . . but I want to see them (1) using Facebook Connect and (2) allowing users to share their ongoing successes via Facebook, Twitter, or MySpace.  Thanks for the reference Stacy!

Dec 13, 2009 5:38:28 PM | Customer Engagement, The Other Side

1 Comment

Stacy Charles

Interesting... there are definitely sites like this which gain some momentum AND require payment, but I think the users must feel that it is an ABSOLUTE necessity. Years ago, I helped the founder of a weight loss site (social media for weight loss) with content development & strategy. Back then it was a pay-per-monthly membership. After some time, and several iterations, the realization emerged that while the social media site may gain momentum with a pay per-membership model, to keep the consistent members, the site needed to be free. The membership is now in the hundreds of thousands and the funding comes through other sales.

Posted by: Stacy Charles | 12/14/2009 at 11:02 AM

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