Digital Marketing and Web Strategy by Bob Hazlett | One Half Amazing!

Bob want brains!

The Memphis Zombie season is fast approaching and this year’s event will take place Friday, May 28th starting at 6:30pm (come early if you want your makeup done).  You’ve probably seen me pimping the event on twitter for the past 2 months or so.  From what I’ve read, this year is supposed to be bigger and better than the past events.  Memphis Zombies have a complete run down on what to expect.  It will blow your mind, and I’d definitely recommend you take advantage of the spectacle that is Memphis Zombie Walk.

If you’re trying to shed some weight from the winter and want to make sure you don’t get taken by the upcoming apocalypse, Wired Magazine has put together a zombie workout routine.  It focuses on lots of jumps, hurdles and runs to strengthen your legs and core in case you need to breakaway or hurdle buildings and barriers.  Here’s a synopsis of it.

Survival Workout

1. Climb
Zombies aren’t very spry, so climbing over barriers is a key evasive maneuver. Practice on a wall that’s a little taller than you.
Extra training: Pull-ups, bench dips
Muscles worked: Core, triceps, deltoids

2.  Free Fall
Jumping off a roof may provide temporary respite, but break a leg on landing and you’re dinner. Cushion the impact by extending your legs and touching down on the balls of your feet. Then get up and make tracks.
Extra training: Toe raises
Muscles worked: Calves, hamstrings

3.  Hurdle
Run at a sturdy obstacle—park bench, subway turnstile, picnic table. Dive forward, placing both hands on the object, and swing your legs up to your chest. The momentum will propel you over.
Extra training: Air squats, push-ups, sit-ups
Muscles worked: Pecs, delts, quads

4.  Breakaway
“Extricating yourself from a zombie’s grasp uses every muscle in your body,” says Rich Gatz of ZombieFit. Practice by lifting and tossing a big object like a tractor tire.
Extra training: Resistance running, weighted pull-ups and push-ups
Muscles worked: Lats, core, hamstrings

via Wired Magazine

For the 3rd year in a row, I’ll be taking part in 48Hour Launch or what was formerly known as Startup Weekend Memphis. This year, the event begins on the evening of Friday, March 5 and ends with show and tell on the afternoon of Sunday, March 7th.  The entire weekend is a set of orchestrated madness where participants pitch their latest and greatest ideas, folks vote and form teams and then get to work on getting the business off the ground in the short span of 48 hours.

48Hour Launch is one of the most unique entrepreneurship programs in the country.  People of all skill levels and areas including marketing, development and design are encouraged to attend.  Last year, we had some amazing projects come out of the weekend including Mark’s Menus, The Roll Play and Cheezy Weezy. I’ve personally had the chance to meet and work with so many people who I normally wouldn’t.  Its great exploring new ideas with people who are passionate making Memphis the best.

I hope you’ll join us for 48Hour Launch over the first weekend in March at Emerge Memphis Launchpad.  Get your tickets today!

Saturday, Nov 14th marks BarCamp #2 for Memphis.  BarCamp Memphis is a small part of a larger network of user generated conferences or ‘unconferences.’ These events are open to everyone, participatory and ad-hoc. The content is determined and provided by the participants. Its pretty cool to see how it all shakes out.  

A lot of times, the BarCamp focuses on web applications, social media and related technologies. BarCamp Memphis has a list of topics ready for Saturday’s agenda.  Personally, I’m looking forward to Brian Cauble’s presentation on building an iPhone application, the Google Wave live demo and the cool stuff that BuckDaddy and Dave Delaney are going to serve up.  I’m also really excited to hear the panel conversation on community blogs that includes the fine folks at MemphisConnect, Nashvillest and Andre Natta of The Birmingham Terminal.

I’ll be tag teaming a presentation with Daniel Prichettt about setting up your own custom URL shortening service and helping out with some PowerPoint Karaoke during lunch.  I think you all will be in for a treat.

Find out more about me.

I hosted PowerPoint Karaoke last week and wanted to share the results with you. Toggle through the videos below.

In case you’re new to it, in PowerPoint Karaoke, contestants deliver PowerPoint presentations in a karaoke-styled venue. But there’s a twist: Presenters see the randomly chosen slides for the first time when they’re presenting. Presentations are on the clock and off the cuff. For more info, check out PowerPoint Karaoke

Thanks for everyone who came out, Craig from Space150 and the fine folks at Imation. We had a blast. #PPTK

Come out to Social Camp Memphis on Saturday, September 19th at the Memphis Academy of Science and Engineering.  Social Camp is all about social media, social networking and the community of people behind it.

They’re still looking for good people to present their ideas and knowledge. So if you’ve got some burning knowledge or something you’d like to share, let them know.

To register, sponsor the event, or find out more, go to socialcampmemphis.com or follow them on twitter @socialcampmem

Startup Weekend returns to Memphis May 29th – 31st.  In case you’re new to the scene, Startup Weekend is a community building event that brings together the best local developers, marketers, designers and enthusiasts to do what they do best – start projects and start companies.  Your brain synapses will literally be firing on all cylinders for 54 hours straight.

The weekend starts Friday at 6pm and wraps up the evening of Sunday, May 31st.  The founders have put together a Facebook group to bounce around initial ideas, but project votes won’t be made until Friday evening.  This year the plan is to have multiple projects simultaneously move forward at the same time.

To give you an idea of the type of projects that get launched in a weekend, take a look at San Francisco, Phoenix, New York and Lexington.

Startup Weekend is limited to the first 100 people that sign up, so be sure to grab a ticket now.  Help support and grow the entrepreneurial spirit of Memphis.