"Post-Athlete Syndrome: College Runner Style" Podcast (KSS-782 Final Project)

Viral Sport Video (KSS-782)

This is one of my favorite viral sport videos. It is an older one but involves a collegiate track runner and is very inspirational so it will always be a favorite of mine. The video was taken at the 2008 Big Ten Indoor Track Championships. It was the final heat of the women’s 600-meter race. One of the four girls named Heather Dorniden from the University of Minnesota tripped and fell during the race at the 400-meter mark. She jumped right back up and sprinted to catch the rest of the runners in the final 200 meters of the race. She passed all of them right at the end to win the heat.

I think this video went viral because it is a very impressive race as well as incredibly inspirational. Heather didn’t quit when she fell. She got right back up, not to just finish the race, but to win the race. She knew her team needed the points in order to win the Women’s Team Champion title and she never gave up on herself. It is easy to give up and quit when you are down, but to get right back up and continue without hesitation shows true character.

I have been in a similar situation as Heather running in a National Championship race and the pressure and nerves are intense. You picture the race over and over again in your head and know exactly when you are going to change your pace, how you are going to cut in, what position you want to be in at certain points, and which competitors you need to beat. I can’t imagine how much a fall would mess with your physical and mental strategies in a race. Many videos go viral for the wrong reasons, but this is definitely one that deserves to go viral because of its positive message and the girl deserves the fame to go along with it.

On "Sutton Impact" (KSS-782)

I have always admired people who stand up and fight for what they believe in. Bill Sutton is a wise and experienced man in the sport marketing world and offers his invaluable advice and opinions with his column called the “Sutton Impact” in the SportsBusiness Journal. In one of his recent articles, Sutton replied to comments made by Mark Cuban about sports marketing being a worthless major to study. Sutton explained how significant a sports marketing education actually is, and then challenged Cuban to visit Sutton’s sport and entertainment business management program at the University of South Florida to get a first-hand experience.
 
I am the type of person that usually stands neutral in a debate. I like to try to understand both sides of the story and see all of the positives and negatives. I feel uncomfortable with confrontations and provoking others for no good reason. However, there are a few circumstances that really ruffle my feathers.
 
I grew up on a farm and didn’t receive my first cell phone until I was a sophomore in high school. I didn’t get my first smart phone until a few months ago because my entire family did. Parents are now giving kids under ten years old smart phones. Honestly, I feel this is completely unnecessary and seriously annoying. Why is the world so dependent on technology and social media? Is this dependence only going to grow worse in the future?
 
I understand the significance of technology and social media for businesses and marketing, especially in the sport industry, but I don’t think that businesses should solely rely on social media or texting to communicate with their consumers and stay connected. Social media allows people to feel like they are connected to the rest of the world without a real, physical connection. There is no replacement for having customer service and communication skills and I feel like the technology craze is jeopardizing those skills for the younger generation.
 
There are several benefits that social media has contributed to the business world but it may also prove to be detrimental to those that consider it the norm to consume several hours on their cell phone every day. It seems there is no way around this because technology and social media websites will continue to develop. New media and technology seems to make some things in life easier but does it eliminate the learning process that may prove significant for other aspects in life?

Sports and Snapchat (KSS-782)

When discussing sports and new media, the main topics usually involve Twitter and Facebook. However, Snapchat is becoming a more popular method for sports organizations to market to their consumers. In October 2013, the New Orleans Saints were the first team to create a Snapchat account (Burns, 2014). This allowed them to send a picture message to several ‘friends’ through its ‘Story’ function, which was available to be viewed for only 24 hours.
 
Snapchat differs from the other social media platforms because it does not store past content and is only visible for a brief time period. Twitter and Facebook both utilize a news feed to display content to followers, which can all be seen on their websites. Snapchat allows its users to create messages in a unique manner and it is more personal because it involves adding friends in order to view and send content to each other.
 
Social media continues to progress into developing more personal levels of communication. This is significant to sports organizations because this leads to a closer relationship with fans. I think that this will help Snapchat become a common platform for sports organizations to market their content and reach fans, but I know that there will be another new media platform that will overtake Snapchat sooner rather than later.
 
I also think about the issues that are created by Twitter and Facebook for sports organizations because they cannot control the content being shared on these websites by athletes, fans, and personnel. Snapchat diminishes this problem because the content is only viewable for a short time period and is not stored to be viewed in the future. It also doesn’t reach worldwide to the common public so it greatly decreases the chance of someone taking the information out of context and creating more negative publicity from it.

I am a new user of Snapchat so there are still many functions I need to learn about. I’m not sure if I would really use it as a sport manager but I understand how it could be a useful and practical platform for sport marketing. I know that pictures are a popular interest that appeals to many females so Snapchat may also help recruit more women as fans of sports teams by manipulating that feature. Either way, I will be interested to see how many teams eventually follow the Saints and join the Snapchat trend.

Reference:

Burns, M. (2014, March 7). Snapchat's rise as the 'it' social media channel in sports. Retrieved from Sporting News: http://www.sportingnews.com/sport/story/2014-03-07/snapchat-sports-social-media-digital-communications-login

Website Evaluation (KSS-782)

I was assigned a website for a specific sport organization to evaluate its overall effectiveness based on the following: Ease of Accessibility, Ease of Navigation, Use of Interactivity, Use of Video, and Quality of Content. The website that I evaluated is for the Seattle Majestics at http://www.theseattlemajestics.com/.

My first impression of the Majestic’s website was that I liked the colors and the overall design, which was a black background with navy blue, lime green, white, and silver text and graphics. The specific links for the team’s schedule, roster, staff, media, golf, sponsor, store, and contact information were easy-to-read and clearly placed at the top of the home page. Therefore, I found the website to be very accessible and easy to navigate.
 
The home page was filled with four videos from their 2014 season and had their Twitter embedded along the side as well as team and league sponsors, their 2014 team schedule, and ticket price information. The Twitter section was great because it made it simple to tweet at the team or to follow the team right on the home page of their website. The website also had a “Contact” page which allowed people to submit e-mails to the team. I did not find any information about a Facebook page for the team though, but overall the website seemed to have good interactivity with its fans.

The website had several videos, including four from their 2012 season and four from their 2013 season on the media page. There were also four videos from the 2014 season on the home page. The major problem with these videos was that the ones on the media page played the sound only and the picture content did not show up. The videos on the home page worked fine though. Therefore, the use of video needs work on this website. There were also some photos available from past seasons and a news archive.
 
I had never heard of the Seattle Majestics before so I was confused about the website for a while because it was unclear to me what type of sports team it was without digging deeper for the information. The colors of the website are masculine but when I found out that the Majestics were an amateur Women’s American football team, the mascot and the fonts of the site made more sense.
 
A few changes I would make to this website would be to state that they are an amateur Women’s American football team on the home page. I would include pictures on the roster of each player and update the staff photos. The videos on the media page need to be fixed so that the picture content shows up with the sound. It would be beneficial to include more pictures, especially more recent ones, on the media page as well. The “Store” page is confusing because it is only used to buy tickets for the upcoming game, whereas most team stores are for buying team apparel and merchandise, so an easy fix would be to rename that page. The Majestics have a Facebook page which should be linked to their website as well.

The website seems to be thrown together without little attention to details. It seems like they just added some random videos and photos and called it good. As an amateur Women’s American football team that probably has a difficult time attracting large crowds to their games, I think that they should spend some extra time on the details of their website as well as linking their social media sites because these have become important tools for team brand identification. The website is simple and easy but unfortunately this is due to a lack of information and detail.

Technology Deprivation (KSS-782)

The first blog assignment for KSS-782: New Media & Technology was to attempt to go an entire day without using any of the newer technologies, such as e-mail, texting, and web-browsing. In the beginning, I knew the most difficult for me to avoid would be texting, Snapchat, and Facebook. I took the challenge on Friday, May 30^th, because I knew it would be a busy day for me which would keep me from using my phone or computer.

I woke up to the alarm on my phone, which I've used as my alarm clock throughout all of my college years. I didn't have any new texts or Snapchats so it was easy to avoid using those right away but I did catch myself checking the weather on my phone. Then, I went for a run around Vermillion and got ready for work. I noticed that I use my phone a lot to check the time of day.

At work, I kept myself very busy so I wouldn't look at my phone out of boredom. Then, I was sent to deliver season tickets to a few businesses around Sioux City. This was going to be impossible without using the GPS on my phone because not only is Sioux City one of the most confusing places to drive in, but I also have a tendency to get lost easily. Out of everything on my smartphone, I am most grateful for its GPS.

After work, I saw I had some text messages from my sister and boyfriend so I decided to call each of them instead. I knew this would keep them from texting me the rest of the day too. Once I arrived at my apartment, I had to pack and get ready for a wedding weekend in Yankton. I had to use my phone GPS one more time to find the hotel that I was staying at and to call the people I was meeting up with. I left my phone in the hotel for the rest of the night, but there were a few times that I wished I had my phone with me.

In the end, I thought it would be easier to avoid technology than it actually was. It is definitely more difficult to do with a smartphone because it has so many different uses. It is nice having a smartphone as it comes in very handy sometimes, especially when I get lost, but I do wish the world was less dependent on technology.