I Made America

I Made America is a transmedia comedy series that uses video, live events, music, social media, writing and games to tell the story of six Founding Fathers who are kidnapped from the past and brought to 2012 Chicago to be used as props in the upcoming election.

Our Goal

To find broader distribution for the weekly episodes of I Made America, so we can ramp up the transmedia elements around them. The two feed each other and with broader distribution of the episodes, fans of the show will not only feel a personal emotional connection with the characters, they will be reinforced by a true community. This will amplify the power of I Made America and open new revenue streams.

Why I Made America is Uniquely Successful

Viral Videos Draw New Audiences

Using the Founding Fathers, we create short, funny videos that don’t require a knowledge of the plot to enjoy. These videos have been featured on the front pages of HuffPost, MSN, FAIL Blog, The Daily What and others. Each time we’ve released one our audience has grown substantially and all of our episodes have jumped in views. With the added distribution, these viral videos would start their life with a broader reach allowing them to go viral further and faster.

The Founding Fathers Are Media Darlings

Since the Founding Fathers are alive in our world, they can be active in our world, including present on news and featured in articles. Besides the feature stories we’ve gotten on the unique nature of the project itself, the Founding Fathers have appeared in character on WGN and FOX news in 6 segments and have been booked for more. Live events from the show have been featured in most major publications in Chicago. With greater distribution, and with the election fast approaching, the characters would be in even higher demand for media appearances.

The Audience Markets With Us

Since the audience lives in the same world as the Founding Fathers, the audience can actively engage with them and help market th show. When James Madison went missing in week five, we posted hundreds of “Missing Madison” flyers around Chicago. We also posted the flyer online to download. Our fans printed and posted the flyer in 7 U.S. cities and in 3 other countries, giving us the equivalent value of thousands in marketing dollars. And those fans became even more engaged after doing so.

Social Media Mastery

All the Founding Fathers are present on social media and engage actively with existing fans and fans-to-be. And those fans love engaging back. Despite I Made America being a low-budget show with no institutional support, we received 460,000 mentions while The Guild received 500,000.

Transmedia Content Examples

Episode: A Matter of Time – Week 5

Our fifth episode was our audience’s favorite episode. The dramatic turn at the end showed the range of the show and uncovered the depths of their emotional connection to the characters.

The backstory is that James Madison never recovered from his time travel and has been mumbling incoherantly ever since the Founding Fathers arrived in 2012. At the end of the previous episode, Hamilton and Franklin discover that his ramblings are predicting the future.

Music: “Songs From Monticello” by Thomas Jefferson

Thomas Jefferson released his debut EP “Songs From Monticello” five weeks into the story. A song from the EP was featured in an episode of the web series and the whole album was made available for download. We received cover versions from fans and Jefferson was invited to play live with local bands and at the Occupy Chicago event.

Live Event: George Washington’s Birthday

On the Friday before President’s Day, we hosted a free party for George Washington. Although we were only a few weeks into the story, over 100 people attended. The event was featured in HuffPost Chicago, and by several Chcago papers including the RedEye, Chicago’s largest paper by distribution.

Jefferson played live to promote his upcoming album and everyone left with promotional materials to help us spread the word about the show.

Viral: Founding Fathers History Pickup Lines

Founding Fathers History Pickup Lines (in 2012) was our most popular video. Although some of our other videos have been featured more prominently on other sites, the pickup lines one was the most popular with individual fans.

Media: Second WGN Segment

The Founding Fathers were invited to do a segment on the WGN Morning News inspired by the Pickup Lines video. After being in the studio, the WGN team had such a good time that they invited them to stick around for another segment and showed a clip from one of our videos. The Founding Fathers have since been booked for at least one more appearance on WGN.

Merch: Sexy Founding Fathers Calendar

Hamilton is always coming up with get rich quick schemes, and this was the most popular of them. We released a “Sexy Founding Fathers Calendar” around President’s Day. On Social Media our fans responded by ordering the calendar and sending us back “un-boxing” photos of them smiling with their newly opened calendars.