Most sane people might not be aware of it, but there does exist a subculture of zombie-genre fans.  Some works have proven popular (“28 Days Later,” “28 Weeks Later,” the “Dawn of the Dead” remake), but there are dozens of lesser-known films and other works (like zombie novel “World War Z”) that serve a relatively small, but loyal group of fans.  Some fans approach Trekkie-esque levels of devotion to the genre, making possible projects like zombie walks.

The number of zombie films, wildly varied in quality, is staggering.  However, no channel that I’m aware of has attempted to bring the genre to television and take zombies into the mainstream each week.  And attracting an audience beyond the hardcore fans is what AMC will have to do in order to make its new series, “The Walking Dead,” a hit.

In broad terms, this series is pretty standard zombie fare:  a group of survivors attempts to navigate a world in which zombies have broken down human society.

Hardcore zombie fans will eat up “The Walking Dead” the way zombies eat brains, but will the series be able to create new fans?  Most viewers don’t watch vampire movies for the vampires themselves, but for the story that merely uses the existence of vampires as a plot device.  AMC has to sell viewers on more than the zombies; it will have to market the show as good TV first and zombies second.  The channel can’t just say “Look, zombies!” and expect viewer fascination with the undead to do the rest of the work.

As one of those zombie fans eagerly awaiting the series, I’d love to be a part of the marketing team on this one.  It begs for flash mobs, guerilla marketing and social media.  What better tool than Twitter to warn of the dead returned to life?  If you need any more than 140 characters to warn of that outbreak, you’re spending too much time writing and not enough time aiming for zombie brains.

“As a digital ad agency, we are here to integrate and accommodate today’s rapidly changing media and technology landscapes. Part of our mission is to help companies build their brand to yield results-driven consumer experiences. AREA203 was born into the new generation of ‘integrated’ agencies—the hybrid-cross offspring of digital and traditional that’s redefining and recalibrating our entire industry.”

Freeman’s major achievements include: building and managing multi-million dollar online P&L’s for Sprint Corporation and Embarq Corporation; defining and directing the first nationwide launch of wireless data services in the U.S. for Sprint Corporation; leading the digital P&L for H&R Block, the largest tax provider in the United States; leading all business development activities for a multi-billion dollar international wireless company for BellSouth International / Sonofon; and managing a $900M+ product line for a Fortune 50 corporation.

Freeman holds a B.S. in Accounting and an M.B.A. in International Business with Financial emphasis from the University of Missouri.

Doug Freeman - AREA203 Marketing

AREA203 Marketing is a launch-pad for brands that want to lead in the digital age. AREA203 emerged from the growing demand for a new kind of agency—one that holds innovation at its core. An ideas-led agency that produces ideas-led solutions; a place where strategic insights stir up results-driven consumer engagement.

For more information about AREA203, visit www.area203.com or call 866-205-6442.

It wasn’t even a planned visit—it happened by accident. I was early for an appointment, and saw a ton of cars in the parking lot; so I pulled into a parking space. In fact, prior to this, I wasn’t even sure what Greenlife was, but I wanted to know what was attracting people to the building in droves, at nine o’clock  on a beautiful Saturday morning.

Upon entering, I was met by a wheelbarrow filled with wonderful plants and bags of potting soil. So I naturally thought: “A gardening store, perhaps?” A few footsteps further and it became clear to me that Greenlife was not a gardening store. The aromas and relaxing music that came wafting through the air were heavenly. (And as most would agree: there is nothing more aromatic than freshly baked bread. Apparently, I was not the only one who found this combination alluring.

As I continued my exploration, I became acutely aware of shopping carts that were practically spilling over with groceries and sundries. Shoppers were smiling, conversing, laughing, eating, and enjoying their engagements with one another. Did I mention the smiling? This has not been my grocery store experience lately (if ever). I’m more used to screaming kids, stacked merchandise creating obstacle courses in the aisles, customers sharing un-pleasantries with one another, and surly employees who rarely even know where to find the mustard.

Store view of Greenlife grocery

Even though the merchandise at Greenlife seems to be two to three times more expensive than that which can be found at big-box stores, people were loading up their carts. I suddenly had one of those “light bulb moments”: How do I communicate this in-person experience on the web? Oh, if I could just capture this essence!

As an SEO professional, I’m always interested in learning what motivates people to do what they do, and then translating my findings into words that elicit a very similar response on-line. So, I spent an additional two hours observing customer behavior in the store. What did they pick up? What did they put back? It was all such an incredible experience, I practically experienced sensory overload. My husband was eventually able to convince me that if I didn’t leave the store I’d be loitering. However, before my exit I selected a souvenir: organic eucalyptus and peppermint pet shampoo. It only set me back fifteen and a half bucks—roughly four to five times more than what I typically pay for pet shampoo at Petsmart or Walgreens. (Smiling face! Paper—not plastic—please!)

On the way home, I decided to calculate the total cost of my Greenlife education:

brunch for two: $30.00

organic pet shampoo: $15.50

SEO experiment involving human behavior: priceless

People shopping at Greenlife grocery

As a mother, I pay particular attention to advertising that targets children and whether or not it has a positive impact on my little end consumer. Sending the wrong message about a product or service is dangerous and socially irresponsible marketing. I recently came across an article on www.myfoxdc.com about a local fair in New Hampshire. Walgreens sponsored a booth and handed out little bags to kids, in which they had candy filled medicine bottles. Mothers everywhere were in an uproar, fearful that their young ones would get the message that all pill bottles were full of candy. The company issued a public statement apologizing for the giveaway.

Now, do I think that irreparable harm will be done to the brand that is Walgreens–absolutely not. Do I think someone was not using their brain–absolutely. Companies have an obligation to the consumer to act with socially responsible marketing tactics every time their brand is represented, whether it is at a local fair or in a Super Bowl commercial. The most seemingly inconsequential decision can result in a backlash that is harmful to a product’s hard won image. I find that brands can be compared to the children we love so much. A lot of hard work goes into the birth and evolution of a brand; it is comparable to the nurturing of a child. We want to protect the brands we represent as much as our children. Every decision made concerning brand image is important, no matter how big or small.

However opinionated and stubborn I am in certain instances, I continued to listen to the capabilities that these eBook readers offer, and I must admit, I was still a bit skeptical but at the same time impressed.  I decided to do a bit more research on the topic (I looked into the iPad and Kindle) to see exactly what they could offer me that my tattered, worn and much loved paperback couldn’t.

Now, I should preface this by saying that I generally read fiction novels (no, not romance), but I quickly realized that people who focus on research, or even students, would be an ideal market for these eBook readers.  Inkling introduced a “textbook platform” for the iPad, which not only replaces expensive textbooks (when I was in college some of which were $150+), but it also combines social networking, Wi-Fi and/or 3G at the same time.  So, if you’re reading your biology book and don’t understand something, you can actually highlight it, type a question into that part of the text, and when someone in your social network reads it and knows the answer, they can actually provide you with it!  Not only that, but if you don’t understand a word that’s being used in a sentence you can click on it and the dictionary definition comes up, or if you’re using the iPad, it can even supply you with a video to show you what mitochondria look like and how they may play a role in the aging process.

Inkling software for iPad

This type of feature is fantastic as it doesn’t require you to have to turn on your laptop and look something up in the dictionary or on Wikipedia.  However, for someone like me who suffers from an occasional bout of ADD, I can see that leading to a long tangent of looking up various things that I’m all of a sudden interested in and before I know it, I’ve wasted about an hour on things that have absolutely nothing to do with mitochondria.  If I had to look up several items, I can be sure several hours would be wasted.

Other features that are promoted (specifically to the Kindle) are that Classic books, which are out of copyright, are completely free.  Which, I do enjoy reading the Classics, but end up paying the heavier price of about $8.95.  That being said, I’m not paying $140 for the eBook reader, $9.95 per eBook, and upwards of $50/month for 3G connection.

You can have up to 3,500 books stored, just in case you get bored and decide to read multiple books at different parts of the day, and of course, there’s no sound when you’re turning pages.  So if you want to read at night, you won’t disturb your significant other.  However, since the Kindle isn’t backlit, you’ll still have to keep the light on, which may defeat the purpose (the iPad however is, but makes for a glare when reading in direct sunlight).

I’m not saying I’m against the thought of eBooks, as they do offer so much more than a typical book can, and they would definitely have been helpful in college or perhaps if I did a lot of researching on topics that I read about.  Reading, to me, however means no batteries, no social sharing, no distractions, just a way to unplug.

It’s a rock.

Not even close to a window.  Of course, I Googled “window above front door.”  That is a “transom,”  also a lovely word.  It’s from the Latin transtrum meaning “crossbeam,” which is rather neat and logical.  I had hoped for a gem or a link to another word that might prove worthy of exploring.

But travertine and transom do share a purpose: both are used in building designs.  Travertine, it seems, is a ridiculously plentiful rock that literally “grows” over a shorter period of time than other rocks.  It is a limestone that is “grown” out of deposits from mineral springs.  Usually, you can find it in caves – yup, stalactites and stalagmites are travertine.  It’s characterized as highly porous, but polishes up nicely and is a mild tan color.

The Romans used travertine in most of their construction – in fact, the Colosseum in Rome is entirely travertine.  Add longevity to its character list.

Anyway, this puts me in mind of a documentary I watched recently, The Greening of Southie.  The film explores the construction of Boston’s first LEED certified building and the neighborhood’s response.  The soundtrack alone merits your time, but the way the subject matter is handled kicks it to the top of my Favorite Documentaries list (which is really, really short).  LEED certified and green building are many-faceted processes, and I thoroughly enjoyed an hour’s worth of learning.

Another example I came across was “strait.”  We use strait in rather strict senses these days: the Strait of Gibraltar, dire straits (though that is often misspelled)…and that’s all I can remember.  However, “straight” – the heteronym counterpart to “strait” – is widely and colorfully used.  According to the Online Etymology Dictionary (a word nerd’s playground), strait was the original spelling.  It addressed everything from the said narrow body of water, to describing something narrow or difficult, to a “conventional way of life,” to women’s undergarments and restrictive clothing in psychiatric wards.  Straight, on the other hand, only addressed “conventional” or “heterosexual.”

What caused such a dramatic reversal of meanings?  Should we blame Chaucer and a lack of standard spelling?  The Oxford Dictionary ended that.  Should we blame fads started by those in influential positions?  I think they had more effect on women’s undergarments than word definitions.  How have we gone from the visually pleasing and short “strait” to “straight” with its silent gh?  Don’t get me started on the silent gh gnome…

If this piques your interest, you might enjoy a book by Simon Winchester: The Professor and the Madman.  It is a fast-paced tale of words, murder, spelling standards, and restrictive psychiatric ward clothing.

There’s a lot that I don’t understand about this commercial.  Have you ever seen giraffe udders?  I haven’t.  I would think that this commercial would be like the female giraffe version of kidney stones—being milked of Skittles seems entirely unpleasant.  More than anything, though, I want to know why the guy doing the milking is a dead ringer for George Clinton.

Our Peter Berta suggests that it replace “jump the shark.”  Not bad—“Have you seen the latest Old Spice vid?  Yeah, the early ones were great, but at this point they’re milking the giraffe.”  It works, in that if you’re milking a giraffe it’s because you’ve exhausted the supply of good ideas, so you’re willingly going after the bad ones just so you have any idea at all.  Then again, we already have the same meaning when we scrape the bottom of the barrel.

Perhaps one milks a giraffe because that’s about the only part of a giraffe that one can reasonably reach.  Or might the point of milking a giraffe be to make giraffe cheese—something no one could possibly want, but you’d always be remembered as an originator.  People at parties would describe you as the world’s first giraffe cheese magnate.  We’ve already learned about Panda Cheese, so perhaps milking the giraffe means that you should be grateful—you could be trying to milk something that will try to eat you instead of the rainbow.

I don’t mean to imply that this commercial is a bad one.  It’s enjoyable, and in keeping with other recent Skittles ads.  But the phrase “milk the giraffe” is just a little too much fun to leave without meaning.  So let’s make this one a contest.  Post your choice of a meaning for this new expression and contribute your own little bit of history to our language.

: play and freeze ice cream maker

There are two different sizes available: original and mega. After the ice, rock salt, and ice cream mixture are added, the original weighs 7 lbs. and the mega weighs 9-10 lbs. These ice cream makers seem to be very heavy for a small child though. The original takes about 20 minutes and the mega takes 30 to 35 minutes of play time to turn the mix into ice cream. At first I laughed when I saw this Play & Freeze Ice Cream Maker, but the more I looked into the product, the more I realized that it actually is a great idea for older kids when outside of the house or at a campsite or tailgating event.

I haven’t actually tried this product, but I would be interested in trying it out! I also think it would be a great product to have when only a few people want ice cream instead of making a huge container, like a traditional ice cream maker does.

If you decide to try it, let me know how you like it.

Are you ready for some football? I love those words. Now that Fantasy Football is here again, I am reminded of what a big business it has become. According to TIME magazine, it has become an $800 million business not counting the ‘prize’ money.

Boy has it come along way. When I first started playing Fantasy Football, we used newspaper box scores, a pencil, and a calculator to figure out what our team had scored. I then drifted away from the game during my college years; I guess I was too busy going to CMU’s football games and other extracurricular activities. Based on my understanding, this is when everyone started to embrace Excel for their scoring needs. However, there was still a lot of work involved in getting that final score.

The next innovation was software that you could load on your computer and then download the statistics sometime after the games were complete. That is when I came back to the sport as the scoring systems became easier to manage and much less work. Finally, everything moved online and scoring systems became real-time. At that point, the Fantasy Football craze exploded. The games became much more intense since you could follow the score as you watched each team play. If you’re like me, you had several teams and didn’t know what exactly you were rooting for anymore.

As sites like CBSSports.com, NFL.com, and YahooSports.com built their platforms and leveraged this real-time scoring ability, brands and advertisers began to see the power of these passionate crowds. This group or tribe is so passionate that they follow their teams on mobile phones, buy t-shirts sporting their teams’ names, and buy expensive trophies to commemorate their league championships. Some of the brands you will find targeting this group are Ford, Microsoft, Target, and Toyota. Originally, these efforts consisted of banner ads, page takeovers, and other intrusive tactics.

However, recently marketers have become savvier in engaging this group. Last year, on Yahoo Sports, Toyota used its banner space each week to list the “Biggest Fantasy Blowout” within your own league, along with the teams and scores. This gives you the feeling of a major network covering your league with the type of sponsorship tie-ins you would see on ESPN. Toyota Fantasy Enhancer also allowed you to create your own custom Smack Talk Message to send to your opponent, complete with mascots, cheerleaders, and players.

So what are the next steps for Fantasy Football and the marketers that covet this devoted following? Here are four predictions to watch:

1. Video – (As unveiled recently by NFL.com) The big next step for how fans interact with Fantasy Football will be video. DirecTV’s “RedZone” channel will show you the final few plays of any team in a position to score. I predict this will eventually be modified for Fantasy Football so that after your player scores a point, you will be able to watch the play that resulted in the point. At the end of the game, these plays will be compiled to show you highlights unique to your own Fantasy Football game.

2. In-league coverage and sponsorships – Marketers will become more and more integrated within the coverage of your Fantasy Football league, creating a sponsored environment that mimics an ESPN-style broadcast. These sponsorships might become so integrated and personal that the league owners themselves will be able to select which sponsors they want represented in their league. This will, in effect, create micro-sponsorships of specific Fantasy Football leagues.

3. Marketing as Service – Marketers will find that the most engaging advertisements to this group are those that feed into the fantasy of owning their own team. Branded applications and platforms that help them get the most up-to-date player information will be very successful. Banner ads that pull data from individual leagues and that allow recognition of the week’s best performances, along with voting and congratulations for MVPs on their wins, are the types of experiences that will be expected from brands that understand Fantasy Football followers.

4. Substitutions – Now that real-time scoring is pretty standard fare for Fantasy Football leagues, the next step is minute-by-minute substitutions. To make up for player injuries, bad performances, and for a new competitive edge among Fantasy Football providers, some leagues will start to allow you to sub a player in and out of your line-up, minute-by-minute, until you have a total of 60 played minutes for that position. This will allow the die-hard Fantasy Football players to monitor their teams closely over the weekend and feel they have more control over the final outcome of their games. The providers that are able to accommodate this new type of play will be able to grab a good share of a market that is looking for innovation in how the games are played.