HOW WE CAN HELP

your business challenges

• Understanding Conversation About Your Brand or Category
<p>You need to know where and how your brand is being talked about online and beyond its paid marketing efforts. Through our <strong>Digital Footprint Analysis</strong> (DFA) we provide essential insights necessary to develop an effective and sustainable word of mouth and social media campaign.
<ul><li>Know where and how people are talking about and recommending your brand, your competitors and category.</li><li>Measure if and how conversations are being shared.</li><li>Understand what you "own" and where you're threatened – across every critical earned online channel</li><li>Identify key topics of conversation and where you can capitalize upon conversational "voids" in the marketplace.</li><li>Provides a benchmark for measurement and strategic recommendations.</li></ul></p>

• Finding and Connecting with Your Influencers
<p>80% of the online conversation about brands is driven by just 6.2% of online users*. Using proprietary methods, tools and resources we help brands find, identify, engage and build relationships with influential individuals across the <a href="#">Influencer Ecosystem</a> . </p>
<p>We believe that positive, sustainable word of mouth is only achieved by managing influencer voices and opinions in a holistic approach. So we designed a unique approach that will:
<ul><li>Identify the most powerful voices around a brand and category.</li><li>Define what drives conversation and sustainable engagement.</li><li>Measure progress in building relationships and driving advocacy.</li><li>And demonstrate positive business results.</li></ul></p>
<p><em>*Source: Forrester</em></p>

• Protecting and Defending Your Brand Reputation
<p>Our <strong>Brand Protect</strong> service is designed to continuously track and monitor the brand conversation and address misinformation, negative comments and misperceptions wherever they occur – i.e. social media, forums, Search Engine results, Wikipedia page, Twitter URL, and in every other critical online community.</p>
<p>Using a proven 4-step process –Establish, Mitigate, Integrate & Engage – we can quickly and effectively set the record straight directly and/ or enlist and engage supporters and influencers to defend the brand. It’s a powerful approach that is very effective at protecting your good name and preventing a communication crisis from arising. </p>

• Designing a Smart and Comprehensive Word of Mouth and Social Media Strategy
<p>An effective word of mouth and social media strategy defines how to drive sustainable conversation and recommendations where people live, work and play – both online and off.</p>
<p>Our strategy team at Zócalo Group is expert at leveraging insights from the conversation analysis to identify the precise point of leverage to employ – against the most appropriate influencer audiences – to create programs that inspire, activate and empower word of mouth.</p>
<p>We believe that a smart strategy goes well beyond “buzz.” It operates a the center of a brand marketing mix by working to make every aspect of the brand campaign more talkable, sharable and meaningful to consumers in ways that drive recommendations.</p>

• Developing a Sharable Story That Drives Conversation & Advocacy
<p>A <strong>Sharable Story</strong> is simply a messaging map that articulates the “reasons to recommend” a brand in everyday consumer language.  It’s a powerful and important tool to enhance credibility and encourage word of mouth. The purpose and function of a Sharable Story is to define - both in an emotionally and rationally compelling way – how the company would like to see its’ brand recommended in conversation. </p>
<p>Working with the brand leadership team and other key stakeholders, Zócalo Group will conduct a Sharable Story workshop to organize, prioritize, and develop key messages —suitable for embedding in online and offline conversations. The outcome is a well defined set of conversational messages that spells out how we can make the brand the most talked about and recommended product in its’ category.</p>

• Integrating Word of Mouth into Your Overall Business & Marketing Mix
<p>Where does word of mouth and social media fit into the brand marketing mix? At Zócalo Group we recognize the unique role that earned media needs to play in order to drive positive, and sustainable, word of mouth for the brand.</p>
<p>By adding our distinct capabilities to an integrated team approach our Clients often discover that the best role for word of mouth and social media is square in the center of the marketing mix. That’s because every aspect of a brand marketing campaign – advertising, PR, Promotion, Sponsorships, etc. - can be strengthened when the overall messaging and approach is refined to be more talkable, sharable and engaging for consumers.<p>

• Creating Compelling, Sharable Content
<p>.. <strong>Zócalo Studios</strong> is a dedicated team of experts who specialize in developing creative and compelling content and experiences that drive conversation, sharing and recommendations. </p>
<p>Our team of writers, designers, developers, producers and creative directors understand how to deliver the right content to drive sustainable conversation and bring to life the reasons to recommend the brand (Sharable Story). They also know how to deliver the right experiences, whether online, or in-person, to shape brand perceptions, and influence consumer behavior (i.e. purchase decisions) by making it easy for people to share and spread their excitement, enthusiasm and love for your products and services. </p>

• Establishing, Managing and Growing Relationships with Influencers
<p><strong>ZócaloNet</strong> V3.0 is our powerful and proprietary tool for influencer relationship management. It replaces spreadsheets and less reliable methods that Brands’ and their PR partners typically rely upon to identify and follow influencers and instead provides a powerful database solution to track, manage and grow these important relationships.</p>
<p>ZócaloNet centralizes information about influencers into an easy to use dashboard and interface that enables the brand to track, manage and optimize campaign efforts – both online and offline – with greater efficiency and effectiveness. The system delivers real-time actionable information while ensuring knowledge continuity for the organization even when there are changes to staff or partners involved in the programs.</p>

• Increasing Brand Awareness
<p>Social impressions are an important part of measuring word of mouth and social media performance. Zócalo Group has developed a unique social impression measurement called “<strong>Earned Digital Engagement</strong>” (EDE). This tool allows us to demonstrate the unique and specific contribution of our campaigns – within the context of a Brand’s overall integrated marketing efforts. </p>

• Measuring Results and Demonstrating ROI
<p>What does word of mouth and social media success look like? And how will you know when you’ve achieved it? Our industry-leading and award-winning measurement tools are designed to measure and track ROI –both online and offline – specifically showcasing ad equivalency and sales impact.</p>
<p>The Zócalo Group <strong>Digital Footprint Index (DFI)</strong> is a quantitative tool for tracking and measuring a brand’s online conversation. It consists of four separate but inter-related components: <strong>Height:</strong> How much conversation is occurring? <strong>Width:</strong> How is the brand being shared online? <strong>Depth:</strong> Is the brand being understood and talked about in a consistent, meaningful way? <strong>Reach:</strong> How many people are exposed to naturally occurring brand conversations across every online channel? </p>
<p>The results of the DFI provide ongoing metrics from which to gauge program success over time, and also inform strategic changes midstream. The DFI helps brands better understand, measure, and accelerate earned social media engagement across all relevant channels. </p>

• Reaching Hispanic Consumers & Multi-Cultural Audiences
<p>Hispanics are the largest and fastest-growing minority group in the U.S. and will deliver up to 40% of your company’s share of growth over the next ten years. Hispanics are also inherently social – whether it’s connecting in person, online or over the phone, word of mouth has always been an especially important tool for reaching this market. </p>
<p>As the digital gap narrows and blogueras continue their rise, is your brand part of those conversations? Our experienced Hispanic Word of Mouth team knows how to tap into this trend-setting segment to ensure they’re recommending your products & services.</p>

• Driving Sustainable Conversation and Brand Advocacy
<p>The Zócalo Group Conversation Engine is an engagement methodology that proactively drives a steady drumbeat of brand conversation and engagement to spark word of mouth both online and off.</p>
<p class="indent"><u>Online</u> – Blogs, Social networks, Online communities, Forums, Facebook Applications, Video Sharing, Viral Video Creation, etc.

<u>Offline</u> - In-market events, Trial/sampling, House Parties, Pop-up events, Influencer salons, Community Groups, etc.</p>
<p>Through our experience working with a variety of brands and industries, we’ve learned that the best engagement efforts combine social media and traditional word of mouth activities to spark conversation, amplify sharing and sustain involvement. Our ability to integrate both offline and online word of mouth is a key point of differentiation in the work we do. </p>

• Building Demand and Brand Loyalty
<p>Another unique tool that we offer at Zócalo Group is called the <strong>Recommendation Index</strong>. By identifying and measuring the most frequently recommended brands in a given category, and providing insights into the drivers influencing brand advocacy, we can help the brand benchmark demand and loyalty relative to its competition. Tracking changes in the Recommendation Index over time will show growth in brand demand and loyalty. </p>