Many of us in the Running Blog Family have taken advantage of new fangled technology called Twitter. Many runners probably first learned about Twittering from the podcaster Steve Runner who, with the help of his son, twittered his way through this year’s Boston Marathon.
My “twitterverse” or my universe of Twitter has quickly grown with lots of running friends, most of whom I’ve never met except through blogging and e-mail. In the past month or so that I’ve been active in Twitter I’ve encouraged other runners and they have encouraged me. Especially after finding this blog post with a list of running tweeps.
So What is Twitter? Simply, Twitter is the most popular micro-blogging site on the web. The official definition is:
Twitter is a service for friends, family, and co–workers to communicate and stay connected through the exchange of quick, frequent answers to one simple question: What are you doing?
Twitter will help you fill in the gaps in-between blog posts about what is going on in your friend’s lives. Common Craft has a great video that might help you understand Twitter a little better.
Still not convinced you need Twitter? This article written by a CEO Twitterer is what convinced me to take the leap and now I’m hooked to this 140 character phenom. I say go on over and try it out today!
I will say that initially I used Twitter every few hours, but now have gotten into a more realistic mode of posting every few hours and tend to post more highlights, while many people post lots of little details of their day. I have also seen tons of encouraging tweets from runners to other runners who are struggling to get on the road or with other personal issues. If you have 5 minutes a day and want to meet some other great runners and people -- Twitter is the way to go. It might be a little over-hyped but it is a great tool.
If you could only go to one website a day to find out all the latest information about running what would it be? Aww shuck you didn’t have to say this one!
Seriously though…
Check out one of the newest sections at Alltop – running.alltop. Since June 1, 2008 Alltop.com has been collecting feeds from various running related blogs into their nicely laid out site. You can go to the page and see the last 5 posts from 72 different running blogs. That is a lot of blogs but it also a lot of good information!
Some of the blogs are personal training logs while others are great resources such as The Final Sprint, Runnerville, Team Cross Runs, Run to Win, Runner’s Lounge, Nike, Cool Running, and The Complete Running Network.
So you get the idea there is a plethora of information. Overloaded? You can actually close out some of the feeds so it is less distracting.
Be sure to head on over and at least give it a look. They are constantly adding new sites all the time.
I have been a run blogger for exactly a year today! That is exciting and quite a milestone. In some ways it seems like I’ve been blogging a lot longer than that. I appreciate each of you that stops by and spends a little time reading about my running or my insight for the day. Some of you have been with me for the whole year and you should receive some type of honor for that!
I hope you have enjoyed how the blog has evolved. I started it last year after running the Anderson, IN White River Run as a race review and quickly came up with the idea of creating a resource for all of Central Indiana running, thus Run Central Indiana was created. Unfortunately, we decided to move away from Central Indiana, but I wanted to keep blogging. So I created Team Cross Runs.
You can read my very first welcome post here and then when I switched names here.
In the past year I have blogged 254 times! In the past year I logged 1,135.8 miles running and 230 miles on the bike. By a really long shot this was the most read article I’ve written with over 590 page views: Volunteering at a Record Setting Chicago Marathon.
It has been an exciting year and I look forward to another great year. Thanks for your support and friendship!
The results from the highly scientific Team Cross Runs stretching poll are in!
I’m sure you are sitting on the edge of your seat waiting to find out what most people do so I won’t make you wait any longer.
An overwhelming 33% of runners stretch before and after every workout.
There is a 5 way tie between second place with 17% of runners doing each. The second place categories are:
Never
After Hard Workouts only
Before Every Workout
I Stretch All the Time
Ok so this poll isn’t really generalizable due to the large size of the poll – only 6 readers responded to my first ever poll. Thanks to those who did! You can see the full results here.
I might try some more polls in the future – keep an eye out for them!
That’s some good English right there! Did you notice the new blog bling? Probably not unless you looked really closely. It is called a FavIcon.
Still can’t find it? Look up… farther… in the address bar. Found it? Yes it is a 16×16 pixel picture of me running (see right for a larger one)! Whenever you go to any Team Cross Runs page you should see that itsy bitsy picture of me!
If you don’t, you’ve left Team Cross!
Want your own FavIcon? Obviously you should because all the big sites have them! You can go here to find out more about how to set one up! It is a fairly painless process with very little knowledge necessary!
The Running Family has a new Facebook home. This blog is a part of the Complete Running Network and it’s Running Blog Family. I have expanded my participation in the community to include both it’s Facebook Group and am also a Fan!
So if you are a Facebook user, please come join the group. If you aren’t, why not? Everyone’s doing it and it is for more than just kids! Give it a try and say hi!
I occasionally do some consulting work, helping non-profits and groups with fund raising and web communications strategies. I recently was helping a client with some Internet integration strategies and we walked through the basics of blogging. Here are my 11 Basic Blog Building Bloks.
Blog First off what is a blog? You may have been visiting this site for awhile, but do you know the difference between a blog and a website? Blogger (major blog hosting company) defines a blog:
In simple terms, a blog is a web site, where you write stuff on an ongoing basis. New stuff shows up at the top, so your visitors can read what’s new. Then they comment on it or link to it or email you. Or not.
The term was derived from web log, which was shortened to BLOG!
Posting This is a fancy way of saying writing a note on your blog. I’m not sure where the term came from specifically, but it is similar to posting something on the wall for everyone to see!
Feeds or RSS RSS is Really Simple Syndication. Wikipedia says,
RSS makes it possible for people to keep up with their favorite web sites in an automated manner that’s easier than checking them manually.
In other words a Feed or RSS allows you the reader to get blogs delivered to you or you are fed the blog.
Feed Reader A feed reader or feed aggregator is a website or software that gathers all of your feeds and puts them in one location. It mixes all the ingredients (feeds) and serves them to your favorite meal on a silver platter (feed reader). I personally use Google Reader I have also set up this blog to provide you with an e-mail option.
Interaction Part of the beauty of blogging is that there is the opportunity for interaction. The most common form of interaction is through commenting. Many readers express their thoughts about a particular post in a comment. I have appreciated those who comment on my posts and provide feedback! Anyone can comment even if you don’t have a blog. I have also provided ways for you to e-mail me more personal thoughts.
Advertising Some people are able to blog for a full time job! That would be nice, but not a reality for me. They do that through a variety of revenue generating functions. The most common is through advertisements. A quick browse through this site shows a variety of ads. Most of these generate pennies per click and some a % of the final sale of a product. It is a balance to make sure that you are not overwhelmed by ads but also optimize my ability to generate a small revenue stream! These ads are targeted so they are actually of interest to us and not a complete waste of space!
Content A blog is pretty worthless without content! You would stop coming to my blog if I stopped writing on it. You would never have come if it was just any empty shell. I am definitely not the best blogger in the blogosphere, but I try to present polished and relevant content for you. Consistency and relevancy are two important words related to content.
HTML Hyper Text Mark-up Language is the Internet standard language used to create websites. With something like Blogger it is quite easy to have a blog without any knowledge of HTML and most bloggers probably don’t. For some of the more advanced functions of this site I’ve had to learn bits and pieces of HTML code, but am not an expert. I often am having to search tutorial sites to find some specific piece of code.
Publicize Similar to advertising, but this is getting your blog known throughout the web community. There are lots of ways to publicize your site, but the easiest is to join a blog network such as the Complete Running Network. Getting yourself on their blog roll will exponentially increase your readership! Become active in running forums, sharing your stories and ideas and linking to your blog when appropriate. Making sure that your friends and family know about your site, even adding it to your e-mail signature! Commenting on other people’s blogs is also important. Blogging is about community, when you comment on someones blog others will see that and look back at your blog.
Blogging Platforms There are a variety of different companies that offer blogs. The most popular is probably Blogger (owned by Google). Team Cross Runs is being written on the Wordpress platform (they have 2 options, either a hosted platform or a web-based platform). Typepad is also a popular blogging platform. I would say that Blogger is probably the all around easiest to use, but Wordpress offers some great benefits that once you understand can really add value to your blog.
PS I purposely misspelled Bloks in the same way as Clif’s Shot Bloks!
Many of us in the Running Blog Family have taken advantage of new fangled technology called Twitter. Many runners probably first learned about Twittering from the podcaster Steve Runner who, with the help of his son, twittered his way through this year’s Boston Marathon.
Check out one of the newest sections at Alltop – 
I have been a run blogger for exactly a year today! That is exciting and quite a milestone. In some ways it seems like I’ve been blogging a lot longer than that. I appreciate each of you that stops by and spends a little time reading about my running or my insight for the day. Some of you have been with me for the whole year and you should receive some type of honor for that!
That’s some good English right there! Did you notice the new blog bling? Probably not unless you looked really closely. It is called a FavIcon.
The Running Family has a new Facebook home. This blog is a part of the 
you the reader to get blogs delivered to you or you are fed the blog.
