Josh Kadis is a freelancer and marketing consultant specializing in copywriting, web content, and WordPress production for the bicycle industry.
Posted on 25. Nov, 2009 by Josh in Bike Racing, New Media | 1 Comment
With 38% of the votes, Kristof Ramon’s portrait of Jackson Stewart and John Lelangue was the winner of my informal Flickr Cycling Photos of the Year poll. Granted, Kristof’s photo was the one that I used in my blog post and he mentioned the poll on Twitter and Facebook. So that gave him a leg up, for sure. Regardless, here’s what he had to say for himself.
Posted on 19. Aug, 2009 by Josh in Bike Racing, New Media | 3 Comments
For a few reasons, my blog posts have been getting longer and less frequent. I’m happy with that, but the downside is that I don’t have time to complete every post I start while it’s still relevant. With that in mind, I’ll be adding a few previously unfinished posts now that I have some time.
Here’s [...]
Posted on 29. Jul, 2009 by Josh in Bike industry, New Media, Sponsors, Sports Business | 4 Comments
Robert Gourley of Mojave Interactive recently posted this analysis of social media performance during the Tour de France for Trek, Specialized, Cannondale, and Cervélo. What the study fails to address is that Cervélo is a title sponsor of Cervélo TestTeam, whereas Trek, Specialized, and Cannondale are the bike sponsors of Astana, Saxo Bank, and Liquigas. The way I see it, metrics like those used by Mojave are extremely valuable but I think they’re much more useful when tracking single brand’s social media footprint over time.
Posted on 22. Jul, 2009 by Josh in Bike Racing, Bike industry, New Media, Sponsors | 3 Comments
Especially during the Tour, teams and sponsors are generating some interesting documentary-style video coverage of pro cycling. But who’s got the best content? Let’s figure it out! I’ve posted sample videos below from five well known teams and brands. Watch them – or better yet, use the links to check out the full series – and complete the poll to give each a rating. Then vote for your favorite. Voting will be open until the end of the Tour and I’ll post the results next week.
Posted on 19. Jul, 2009 by Josh in Bike industry, New Media, Personal | No Comments
As of last night, I have broken my unintentional streak of missing the Bicycle Film Festival. Brendt Barbur and Friends try to select film that cover the breadth of the bicycle universe and, over the course of a Saturday evening, I watched more than a dozen ranging from 1 to 75 minutes. Here are my impressions.
Posted on 07. Jul, 2009 by Josh in New Media | 8 Comments
This brief article in from Bicycle Retailer was surprisingly controversial yesterday. It reports VeloNews web editor Steve Frothingham talking to another publication about the difficulties of covering Lance Armstrong in the age of Twitter. Responses to Frothingham’s lament have been mostly along the lines of “he just doesn’t get social media.” I think the opposite it true. Steve understands perfectly well that getting our news from high-profile social media users is more similar to getting it from advertisers than it is to getting it from traditional editorial media.
Posted on 13. May, 2009 by Josh in Bike Racing, New Media, Sports Business | 4 Comments
In a recent column for ROAD, I argued that teams and events should more directly serve and monetize the sport’s existing core fan base. One of my suggestions was that AEG charge for the Tour of California’s Tour Tracker website that features multiple live video streams, real-time GPS tracking per rider, photos, chat, etc. And guess what? Universal Sports has done exactly that with its Race Tracker for the Giro coverage that it scooped up from RCS just before the race started. At $3.95 for a stage and $34.95 for the whole race, the Giro Race Tracker is pricier than the $25 I suggested in my column for the Tour de France. But I gave it a shot today, watching side-by-side with Universal Sports’ free live online video. Here’s my analysis…
Posted on 07. Apr, 2009 by Josh in Bike industry, New Media, Trends | 7 Comments
The bicycle isn’t something about which we have a common cultural understanding in the same way that many of us instinctively understand cars or baseball or that you’re not supposed to eat ice cream for breakfast. Beyond simply learning how to ride as a kid, cyclists rely on sharing individual experiences with each other. That’s why social media has been so significant in both professional cycling and the more utilitarian uses of bicycles.
Posted on 27. Feb, 2009 by Josh in Bike Racing, Bike industry, New Media, Sponsors, Sports Business | 3 Comments
More than any other pro sport, cycling has taken to Twitter like a fish to water. I believe it’s because the approachability of the tweet fits with the already approachable nature of the sport. As Twitter and other social tools permeate our everyday lives, myths will become human and a pre-humanized sport like cycling will adapt more quickly and naturally than its larger counterparts. In other words, we’ll benefit from the convergence of what Mike refers to as the road version and the raw version.