Whether you're going out on a fishing trip, discovering new hiking spots, or heading out for a weekend of camping, the Trailblazer is an ideal companion for your active lifestyle.
Picture this: You are a business professional who also likes to be fit, or maybe you are looking to start a new workout routine and get into shape. Guess what? Run This Town, a collaborative fitness event, allows professionals and aspiring professionals to connect with each other and exercise. The best of both worlds.
Guess what else? In this age of technology we live in…there’s even an app for the same thing! Check out, Networkingout. It’s an upcoming application; kind of a LinkedIn meets the Nike + GPS application, where business professionals from various career fields are given the opportunity to connect with one another. Not only are they given the opportunity to advance their careers, but also to find a person to exercise with and get motivated by. 
By now, you are probably curious as to how such an unheard-of idea was developed. The answer to that is slightly unexpected.
“Networkingout was really an accident,” said Terrence Thompson, CEO and co-founder of Networkingout. “Shawn Blanchard, Armond Harris and I got together back in 2012 to start a running group of our peers. We called it Run This Town. It grew extremely fast to 80 plus people by the fourth week. But because our peers consist of professionals, we noticed that people were naturally networking. Not just professionally, but around exercise, and socially, too. That’s when we coined the term ‘Networkingout.”
As you read above, Networkingout stemmed from Run This Town. Local chapters of Run This Town coordinate getting these professionals together and host the running events. Power walkers, joggers, runners and more all come to network and exercise on a large scale. There are chapters in Detroit, Ann Arbor, Kalamazoo and even Chicago! You can check out the events calendar to keep up with all of the runs.
“The great thing about Run This Town is that there is something for everyone. We meet people where they are by emphasizing collaboration and personal best,” said Thompson. “Networkingout is about us helping each other be better than we were the day before –personally and professionally.”
Back to the application, the features include: a news feed, messages, connections, groups, activities and events. Detailing some of these features a little bit more, the news feed allows you to keep up with job and fitness opportunities. The connections feature focuses on helping you find other professionals with similar fitness goals and interests and gives you the opportunity to meet them. The activities section allows you to tailor your favorite fitness activities, which helps you to connect to people with similar interests and shows you what you are good at and what you may need to improve on.
The mobile app will be available for both iPhone and Android markets, but it will also have a website-based and mobile website-based platform as well. It is expected to launch in late July or early August.
“We’re deep into development now, and will start our private testing here in the next few weeks,” said Thompson.
This app will have a few Intended uses, including: finding networking partners while traveling on business, developing a new network upon relocation to a new city or state, support from other professionals participating in the same or similar events and more.
In other news for the Detroit-based business, there will be a 4.01K run (clever, right?) and a 10K run on Saturday, August 30 along the Detroit Riverfront. Registration is now open for that. The mission of these runs is to raise awareness about the need to live a balanced and healthy lifestyle.
In addition, on the date of the runs listed above, Networkingout will be accepting donations of lightly worn clothes to give to the needy. Four nonprofit organizations will receive the donations: Jackets for Jobs (Detroit), Dress for Success Michigan (Ypsilanti), In The Image (Grand Rapids) and the Kalamazoo Dream Center (Kalamazoo).
This was a one of a kind idea that has now been developed and will soon become a reality for professionals looking to connect and stay fit! Congratulations to Terrence Thompson and the entire Networkingout team on the development of this app. Be prepared for Networkingout to hit the market later this summer.
