Fuze Blog | ©Bryan Landaburu (aka Willie Vega) | Reno.Sparks Blogger

Reno Airport vs. Las Vegas Airport "Free" WiFi

So this is a post that came from a "Tweet".  Originally I posted these to TwitPic, but today, in an effort to get organized I was cleaning my desktop and came across these 2 photos that contrast the "free WiFi" in Nevada's 2 major airports.  It got me thinking that I haven't ranted enough on the topic.

Here at the Reno Tahoe International Airport (RNO), the local fishwrap (RGJ) has made it their charter to "monetize" free WiFi access at the airport...turning access into a profit center through the "magic" of abundant banner advertising. See ad's circled below:

In comparison, our friends to the South, Las Vegas McCarran International Airport (LAS) have a version of "free WiFi" that is not littered with banner advertising. See below (notice no pink circles):

One must wonder how in the world Las Vegas survives and puts shoes on their kids without "monetizing" their free WiFi. Must EVERYTHING be a streaming ad? 

Speaking of RGJ...on the RGJ's redesigned site (which I think is a vast improvement over the previous rev) you are still served irrelevant ads non-stop - constant pop-outs, video ads, display ads, and random links disturb the user experience on the site. Other newspapers seem to manage without it (ex. TheGuardian).  So, if one must have ad's to keep ones publication alive, then cant one serve the ad's contextually and relevant?

The ad's on RGJ are rarely (if ever) served contextually.  Example: I am reading a story about Artown, so OF COURSE I am REALLY thinking about Carpet Cleaning (a video ad for Evergreen carpet care was served in the article).  An example of a good contextual ad here would be something for downtown bars/restaurants, art galleries, or something that GOES WITH ARTOWN.  My theory for the reason ads on RGJ.com are most often OUT of context and irrelevant is that they don't have enough advertisers to be contextual and relevant.  They just need to fill inventory.  To their advertisers, they call this Johnny Appleseed disbursement of advertising "value-add" but I call it "wasted-cash".

Anyway, I don't [necessarily] want to rant on our local news rag because they publish many (1) articles about Fuze and Me. I just think the free WiFi should be free.  Simple, no?

BL

I've Been To Reno...err Greater Reno[dash]Tahoe

Was passed this today by some of my more creative friends and i am going to try to spread it "virally" to my 10's of loyal readers.  From Corey McAbee, comes this Sundance Short Film Entry on our fair city.  Lyrics are damn funny if you're from here.

Here is also a link to Corey's Sundance Institute interview on the concept.  It's cool, not just cause I said so.

Enjoy it a plenty.

BL

A Tale Of Two Dennis' - American Greed Body Double

Boy oh boy, this has nothing to do with marketing.  As always, I have my CNBC running background in my office here all day and this afternoon I caught the first episode of their new docu-series American Greed featuring the STELLAR Dennis Kozlowski who stole millions from his company ($30Mil for his NYC pad, $1mil for his wife's 40th b-day party, etc.).  As I watched this guys rediculousness, I started to realize how much he looks like Northern Nevada's own pimp, turned business mogul, a one Mr. Dennis Hof. My friends, I think we have a body double on our hands:

   

Both named Dennis, both rich, both love women and hookers, yet, here is an interesting epiphany for the world: Nevada's most famous PIMP, owner and proprietor of the "world famous" Moonlight Bunny Ranch, is a better guy all around than the former CEO of the Tyco corporation.

Yes, I will be taking credit as the first one to put this sexy pair together.  Ohhh sweet irony...

BL

More Email Superbad - EDAWN

Sorry I have to be the police on this but another poorly crafted email hit my inbox today, this time from my friends at EDAWN.  Here are some issues:

• Message renders illegible in Outlook2007, no option to view online.
• No identity/branding/logo that shows who this is from or what it's about.
• My sweet hot-pink box below represents what the typical "preview" area is in most mail clients.  As you can see in this case, that entire area is blank.

I dont mean to bash EDAWN, we are members so I am very receptive to, and interested in all their emails and events.  This series is a mess.

I get off on these rants sometimes because things come in waves.  Last year it was mobile phones, this year so far, email.  Alas.

Hopefully EDAWN will get it sorted out and then i can give them some McLovin.

BL

Fuze Icon Borrowed [stolen]

This morning my desk was graced with the presence of the Northern Nevada Addy Awards Program.  As I leafed through it, I noticed my prediction was correct that the great Walker Lake advertising swept pretty much every category from ads, to copy, to photography, to web, to eblast, to bathroom stall art, etc. While I don't really "get" the premise of the ads, they are in fact, lovely. Congrats to R&R. 

As I continued turning pages I came across a program ad that sure got MY attention.  Seems the Bauserman Group has paid their friends at Fuze an homage in the form of "bomb" advertising (as depicted below):

This simply MUST have been an oversight, right? Oh well, after 5 years, we're kind of tired of that bomb so if you guys want it, hell, keep it.

Sorry I missed the Addy's this year, I bet it was a hootenanny.  Alas, there was a re-run of Deal or No Deal on Friday night. Boy, I love that Howie Mandel.

BL

Airline musings. March edition.

Things are a little hectic around the Fuze camp. Primarily because I have been jetsetting like a madman. I just realized I am sitting across from David LaPlante from Twelve Horses on this flight. It was nice to catch up a bit since we've been trying for months to schedule a meal together. Anyway, I am heading out now on my 3rd venture to San Diego in 6 weeks. Lots going on down here. I am nearing speaking paralysis these days. I haven't done a slide count but I believe I have prepared about 200+ Powerpoint slides for various events in the last few weeks. I just wrapped up at SMX West and the Miva Developers conferences last week. This week is NFRA. See other posts for show wrapups.

The hive is buzzin with things to do. I think Calder and I (mostly Calder) have done an excellent job of positioning ourselves within the ad space in northern nevada which is keeping him, dan and the other artists plenty busy. David is hangin tough on the interactive side and is really becoming loved by the clients. Our development crew's plate is pretty full for the remainder of the quarter and our pipeline also looks good. That seems to be common among my peers in the space as well. Things seem steady on the web side. We've expanded our relationships and service offering with our email marketing providers, commerce platforms, testing platforms, and our analytics providers, further strengthening a line up that was already pretty strong. My charter remains to continue to cart our course to a diverse client mix that is industry & geo balanced. So far so good. We have also revamped our client review and project management processes to be much more systematic. We have formalized all our internal procedures - many of which were just in need of evolution vs. revolution. So anna our agency coordinator has her work cut out in order to keep all of us on track. We have added media strategy and media buying to our business, out of necessity mainly, but Fong is very capably manning that ship. Finally we have extended our services even further by adding full-service Public Relations through our partnership with RKPR who are helping us win, and manage these great new, and existing accounts.

We added the following new clients in Q1:

• Clearstar Credit Union - agency of record
• Magiko Carson Valley - agency of record
• NNDA (the other white meat in the Econ.Dev space) - agency of record
• Reno Tahoe Blues Fest - agency of record
• Lazaro SoHo - for email marketing
• Food Bank of Northern Nevada - interactive agency
• Cashill Law - agency of record
• True Blue Gaming - agency of record
• The Gaming Standards Association - agency of record
• Legends Reno Tahoe Open - while not a new client, we have formalized our relationship with the tournament and will take on all interactive Agency tasks in 2008
• Titan Construction Supply - agency of record
• JP Menante Real Estate - interactive agency

We have completed site launches for:

• The Entrust Group
• University Health System
• Boyd Gaming
• You Name It Events
• Fennell and Associates
• those are off the top of my head...there are probably others.

If you're wondering how we get it all done? Its with a team of about 15 folks who are dedicated to their craft and making big shit happen. We are also getting ready for another round of hiring, though the positions are already spoken for (in our heads). There is a lot on the plan for the remainder of 2008. We WILL launch a new website(s) to better represnt who the hell we are. Its brewin'. Trust me its brewin'. But, as most are aware, we are not big on exploiting our work, so in the meantime you probably won't see things like:

"Fuze awarded a website job", or "Fuze chosen to build an ad" in the business journal, awards events, or the local fishwrap. Those items are hardly newsworthy.

We rather enjoy our underground status...it let's me write from the cuff, typos and all, and simply let the work speak for itself.

Thanks to all who have helped get our 2008 off to a great start. Come on baseball season...opening day countdown. T minus 4 weeks...

BL


(another treo post...sorry for the typos)

Reno is cool now...we have a District!

In an ongoing effort to "hang" with the big cities, we have our first official "district". Welcome to SoDo. It's official...we're real now.

Here are a couple potential other districts:

• SoMo - South Meadows area (obvious)
• NoDo - lets hurry and classify the university area NoDo because the University District takes too long to type.
• E40 - east of downtown on 4th street where you can easily score a 40. Don't tell me 4th street is all hip now cause my dad rustles off sleepy folks from his business porch daily.
• HoHo - this district is 5 miles east of sparks where prostitution is legal.
• JethHo - this is the area with the ill fated Park Lane Mall which was never acquired (but not for lack of effort) by Max Baer (Jethro Clampet)
• 2WD - a hip spin on double-wide for Sun Valley (our neighbor community to the north). Still sporting two entries in the Guiness for being the worlds largest trailer park, and for having the highest concentration of convicts.
• others? Submit some...I'll post 'em.

Ok you Reno purists, before you start flaming and hurling on me...take it easy...this is a joke. I like reno. I like living here. I like having my business here. I am a 4th generation native Nevadan...so I am authorized to make funnies about my home town. If we can't laugh at ourselves, then what have we become?

That said, I am starting to think we can't we come up with ANY ideas of our own. Does everything have to be a copy of what exists someplace else (and we have it too)? We have some cool "San Francisco style" restaurants. And a couple swell "Vegas style" nightclubs. We have some hip "New York style" urban highrises. What is Reno-style? Anyone know anymore? Sometimes I think we chase our tails trying to be a big city when the charm of this place is in the city's moniker: The Biggest Little City In The World. Still works for me.

I don't see our area as being cool because we have districts, and "xyz-style" stuff. Rather, Greater Reno(dash)Tahoe is unique because of the people, the mountains, the world class skiing, world class recreation, miles of open trails, 2 stroke vehicle accessibility, all the nearby lakes, the climate, the location & proximity to so much. The river redevelopment is cool, california avenue is cool, the first street bar & nightclub areas are cool, downtown Sparks & the marina are getting cool (though I am partial), Grand Sierra has turned into a very cool casino resort (and is doing original and interesting things people said "will never work here"), outside of Gotham center/urban-ia, our neighborhoods are still safe & nice, traffic ain't that bad (though the skill level of drivers is low), and in spite of rising/falling housing costs, this is still an affordable place to live - in comparison to a big city.

Folks, lets all vow to keep reno weird! Oh wait, that's Austin...oh well, use it till we sort something else out.

WBV

[another treo post - sorry for the typos]

EDAWN Launched A New Website

The Economic Development Authority of Western Nevada, and 'friends of ours' launched a new website today.  Comments on the site and "can do" reserved, we loved this particular section:

I'll say that I know most everyone on this page and this is not a flattering photo of any of these people (David excepted because he's so damn photogenic).  They may have a grievance to file with SAG.  Anyway, congrats to EDAWN on launching their new site (finally replacing the tired, chopped up version of the old one WE BUILT for them in 2000).  Much luck with the new improved web presence.

WBV

The Reno Tahoe Open has a new title sponsor: Legends

Senator Randolph Townsend speaks at Reno Tahoe Open Press Conference at Montreux.

We are excited, as always, to be so involved with the Reno Tahoe Open and today we are very excited for our PGA tournament who just announced their new title sponsor. The tournament will now be known nationally as:

The Legends Reno Tahoe Open

Title sponsor, The Legends at Sparks Marina (a RED Development project) is a little $1.2 Billion master development in our home town of Sparks, NV.  The Legends project is terrific for Sparks, and will be a giant entertainment, dining, residential, gaming, resort destination and is under construction now. Today's press conference had an amazing turnout and demonstrated a great amount of support for the event from sponsors, influential leaders like Senator Townsend, Mayor Geno Martini, RSCVA, Montreux, and on and on.

This new title sponsor is a great fit and will energize this tournament. As I have said before...get out and support this tournament. It is a fantastic event that supports our communities and drive enormous traffic to this area.  More press to follow.  For more information about the event visit: www.renotahoeopen.com

Sparks is on the map folks. Game on!

WBV

[another treo post - sorry for the typos]

Sweeter deal - iPod Touch Giveaway @ RTYPN Summit

To sweeten the deal, and to encourage attendance at our incredibly interesting booth at this year's Reno Tahoe Young Professionals Leadership Summit, we decided to give one lucky young professional, their choice of:

• the New Apple iPod Touch [more info]
  or
• a month of beer
  or
• 2hrs of our undivided attention

Thats a little something for everyone [we think]. All that for dropping your business card in our crystal chalice. Who says you cant have something for nothing. Join us wont you?!

WBV