A Wild Tale of Helping a Foundation Brand Find Its Voice

Miami has a not-so-well-kept secret that, for those who visit, is a unique, memorable and totally Instagrammable experience.

The Zoological Wildlife Foundation (ZWF Miami) is home to nearly 200 exotic animals including lions, leopards, camels, otters, baboons, monkeys, anteaters and more. The mission of the foundation is to provide a safe haven and better quality of life for these animals that come from all parts of the world and even at time have been rescued from at-risk situations, such as canned hunting.

ZWF raises funds to continue to provide a better way of life for the animals by offering tours and one-of-a-kind personal animal encounters for members of the public with a focus on educating visitors on wildlife conservation.

The Job

 RockOrange was hired as the Agency of Record by the foundation in 2015 to help the brand find its voice, increase brand awareness and drive visits to the property.

RockOrange set out to launch a content driven omni-marketing campaign showcasing ZWF’s exceptional, upscale experience as well as their commitment to their animals.

The Fresh Ideas

We started by honing the brand’s voice. Focusing on the animals and their experience in the zoo, the goal was to showcase the commitment and respect ZWF has for their animals. This also provided the opportunity to keep the tone light and imbued with the animals’ fun personalities.

All digital properties, including the website, social channels, and user-review sites, such as Trip Advisor, were updated with the new voice, and an SEO campaign was launched that helped raise the client’s Google page ranking from one to three.

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Snackable, shareable content in the form of photos, videos and blog posts was produced demonstrating the relationship between the animals and ZWF’s team and shared via a social media strategy with a focus on consistency.
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Private tours and animal encounters were arranged with local and national influencers who were encouraged to amplify awareness of the foundation by sharing images and videos of their visits with their established social communities.

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ZWF, its founders and brand ambassadors were weaved into the conversation by keeping a close eye on trends in wildlife conversation and a relationship was built with key media through media tours, FAMS and sharing of newsworthy content.

The Solid Results

ZWF’s online presence increased by 343 percent. Website traffic increased by 63 percent, the brand’s social media following shot up 67 percent and a 13.41 percent engagement with ZWF’s Facebook community was maintained.

The increased digital presence and media coverage resulted in their ranking on TripAdvisor as the #5 Best Thing to Do in Miami, #9 Best Zoo in the World, and #4 Best Zoo in the U.S. Brand sentiment increased from 92 percent positive to 98 percent positive and brand negativity decreased 67 percent.

ZWF was mentioned on Good Morning America, Today Show, Inside Edition, Associated Press, Reuters News Service, CBS Miami, USA Today, Yahoo!, The Miami Herald, NBC 6 in and thousands of other broadcast and internet publications.

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Influencers including Kate Upton, Kourtney Kardashian, Jonathan Cheban, Adrienne and Chris Bosh, Adriana Lima, Lele Pons, and Dan Le Batard all visited the property and shared content on their social media channels.

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Relationships were forged on behalf of ZWF with Greater Miami Convention & Visitors Bureau, Gilt Groupe, St. Jude Research Hospital, South Florida Concierge Association, Amigos for Kids, HBO, and New York University.

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Additionally, RockOrange secured the filming of HBO’s hit series Ballers, which stars celebrity Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson.

Overall, the content driven approach proved successful in increasing revenue for the foundation by 217 percent in the first year of the campaign.

How Can You Build Your Personal Brand?

As the 2016 U.S. presidential race heads into the home stretch there are just a few points separating the candidates which is why, beyond the party politics, their personal brands have never been more important in helping sway opinion and those still undecided voters.

While Clinton and Trump have teams of people working around the clock to help craft their messages and perfect their image online and IRL, there are plenty of lessons that brands and individuals can take from the race to build support for their own personal branding campaigns.

That’s why this week we’re exploring those lessons and asking our RockStars – how can you build your personal brand?

What Does it Take to Turn Gold into $$$?

Winning gold at the Olympics can change an athletes’ life in an instant. Global broadcast, print and social coverage can make an athlete a household name…. overnight.

But with fame doesn’t always come fortune. If an athlete wants to be the next Ussain Bolt (who has an estimated net worth of around $60 billion,) they need to understand that however hard it was to achieve, winning a gold medal isn’t the end game… it’s just step one in building what can potentially be a highly profitable personal brand.

So what do this year’s gold medal winners need to do to avoid the fleeting 15-minutes-of-fame syndrome? We asked our RockStars for their thoughts and posed the question – What does it take to turn gold into $$$?

How Can You Have Fun With Your Brand?

Did you see the Michelle Obama episode of Carpool Karaoke? If you didn’t stop what you’re doing immediately and click on this link.

So did you get it? Her message that is. Nestled in between her flawless rendition of Stevie Wonder, Beyoncé inspired dance moves and surprise appearance of Missy Elliott, FLOTUS took full advantage of the opportunity promote her initiative to support the education of girls around the world – Let Girls Learn. And with over 32 million views on YouTube to date, not to mention all those who tuned in to watch it on The Late Late Show, the reach of that message has been amplified far beyond traditional marketing methods could have taken it.

Now, we might not all have the influence of Michelle Obama, but it was an important lesson for brand marketers in that you’ve got to give yourself permission to have fun. And that’s why it inspired this week’s ‘Question-of-the-Week’ – How can you have fun with your brand?

 

You, Too, Can Own Your Platform. (And You Should!)

By David Naranjo
Indulge me for a moment in some “back in my day” reminiscing.

When I was coming up in the world of media and communications, leading a team of PR pros at Sony Music and later the Estefan Enterprises, we worked hard to gin up positive coverage for our artists. More coverage equaled more units sold, so these earned opportunities were golden. Those media gatekeepers could make or break a new album, a career, or a label itself.

Needless to say, things are different today. For musicians and entertainers the revolution kicked into high gear back in the mid-00s with the rise of MySpace as a proto-platform to own the messaging and imagery associated with your brand. With a little bit of HTML and a lot of elbow grease, you could bring your art to millions, where you once needed a label, a marketing team, and an interested media. The MySpace page became the new street team (not coincidentally around this time Sony and other record companies decommissioned their own networks of real street teams).

And we know the story from there: MySpace begat Facebook, YouTube, Twitter and Instagram, and for artists more targeted apps like Soundcloud and Bandcamp integrated nicely. Cobbling together these pages with a centralized website and blog makes an effective, elegant platform for artists. Tend that social media garden well enough, and it becomes hard to remember why we ever needed media outlets so badly.

Of course, we love our friends in the press, and they always make our jobs easier. But the best brands today are leaving nothing to chance. Like those bands inhabiting the early MySpace, smart brands are creating their own platform for message management.

Our client Zappos recently engaged us for a back-to-school campaign. The deals were great, as was the apparel. And the brand is noteworthy in its own right—definitely not an unknown, frequently covered by mainstream press and trades. But this was a back-to-school campaign, straining its neck to be noticed in a sea of other back-to-school campaigns. Earned media coverage was incredibly unlikely without some kind of elevation.

We used the brand’s social media platforms to link out to guest bloggers whose influence made the campaign into actual coverage-worthy news. Now, it wasn’t just half off your second pair of sneakers. It was mommy bloggers bragging about the pairs of shoes they had gotten for their kids. Engaging with the influencers, we were able to rise above the commercial noise.

Sometimes the need to control the message speaks to the brand’s very existence. Consider a quick service restaurant client of ours who was facing a very difficult investigation in Europe into their locations. The sensational story gave short shrift to the facts and was bombastic in all the ways you hope to avoid for your clients.

So, rather than engage with the journalists in their forum, we marshaled the strength of the brand’s social media to publish facts about the situation, taking a crisis and turning it into a teaching moment. This kind of education would have been impossible on any platform other than the client’s own. The strategy was effective: the news magazine shelved a planned sequel to their report after our own messaging essentially defanged their reporting.

Here is a healthy exercise for anyone leading a brand’s communication efforts: imagine you have something incredibly important to say, something everyone needs to hear, and you have to do it right this moment. How would you do it? Would you be reliant on someone else to do it for you? Is your social media presence primed and active? Have you tended that garden? What shape are your lists in? When’s the last time someone organically signed up for your newsletter? Do you have a newsletter, if only to collect email addresses?

Media companies spend millions to refine their platforms. So should you. No one can tell your story better than you.

Smart PR or Dumb Celeb? #conspiracytheory

Celebrity influencer posts are going viral for all the wrong reasons. Celebs including Scott Disick and Naomi Campbell appear to have “accidentally” copy and pasted a little more than they should when promoting branded goods – namely the notes on ‘how-to-post’ as provided by the brand PR.

However, those “mistakes” are making the posts go viral and amplifying brand recognition even further which makes us wonder (#conspiracytheory) if this trend is ‘Smart PR or Dumb Celeb?’

 

Brand Cleveland Rising

So, this space was supposed to be reserved for an exultation of the Golden State Warriors’ second consecutive NBA title and an exploration of their innovative fan outreach. The Warriors, for the past 24 months, have been the NBA’s flagship brand, led family values, kid-friendly Stephen Curry, a player who is every marketers dream. They have no less than six bona fide stars on their team, and consistently lead the league in jersey sales.

However, that storyline went out the window Sunday night when Kyrie Irving hit a late three-pointer and LeBron James sealed the win with a free throw, earning the Cleveland Cavaliers the franchise’s first NBA championship and Cleveland’s first championship in more than 50 years.

There might be no bigger brand turnaround story than the Cleveland Cavaliers. Owner Dan Gilbert’s franchise has pulled a 360 during the past decade. In 2007, a much younger James led Cleveland to the NBA finals, where the San Antonio Spurs summarily crushed them. In 2010, James—the hometown hero who made the Cavs relevant nearly single-handedly—signed with the Miami Heat as a free agent, leading that team to four finals trips and two titles. Meanwhile, the talent bereft Cavaliers began a putrid four-year stretch as the worst team in the league.

Then The King came back. When James announced he would return to Cleveland in 2014, it portended better times, and they were immediately improved as they played their way to the championship round despite a hobbled supporting cast. However, the Cavs lost to the Warriors in 2015. Still, James’ return immediately made the team twice as valuable, rocketing up the list of NBA valuations.

And that was before Sunday’s win. After a historic comeback against grim odds, the Cavs have completed their comeback as a brand refreshed. Some 31 million viewers watched the final game, making it the most-watched NBA Finals game since Michael Jordan’s heyday. Returns are early, but bandwaggoneers are already clearing shelves and online inventory of team apparel. Kids across the country are wearing Cleveland’s number 23. Season ticket sales for NBA champs are invariably higher than the previous seasons, assuming no loss of star power. On that topic, James, who reasserted his claim as the best player alive, is expected to re-sign with the Cavaliers during his impending free agency. Six years ago under similar circumstances, Cleveland fans were left disappointed when LeBron took his “talents to South Beach.” Such a move is highly unlikely this year.

Everything is coming up Cleveland. It’s a great story about an underdog made good. James and Cavaliers have proven that the NBA is a rare brand ecosystem where one talented person, properly focused and channeled, can literally reverse a brand’s destiny.

Back to Basics: Helping Supply Chain Services Tell Its Powerful Brand Story

Supply Chain Services (SCS), a company that provides customized purchasing and supply chain solutions to companies in the hospitality, food, retail and service industries, approached RockOrange with a challenge many companies face: does your brand tell a powerful story?

The best brand stories are those that are compelling, emotional, and proactive. Often, they just need to be simple so that the target audience can connect with it. SCS wasn’t telling its brand story in a way that helped them differentiate themselves from competitors or communicate the achievements of their seasoned team. As a result, they weren’t generating the buzz and awareness they wanted among their target market.

RockOrange worked closely with SCS to craft a more inspiring story that will humanize their brand and make it more consumer-friendly by simplifying their message. Their initial messaging utilized a lot of industry jargon that was confusing for the general audience.

We knew that their content had to change drastically so anyone could understand the work they do. But content was just the beginning. We needed to take an integrated approach to completely rebrand them in order to accomplish their goal.

First, we created a tagline for SCS that summarized the message they wanted their audience to walk away with: “Leave it to Us.” SCS’ main message to their clients is that they don’t have to worry about anything, because the company will work as an extension of their team through collaborative efforts. With a relationship with more than 300 suppliers, SCS helps companies develop the supply chain strategy that best fits their unique business goals, including purchasing, contract negotiation, distribution and logistics, and global sourcing and fulfillment solutions.

Second, we revamped the look and feel of their website and worked with our digital and creative team to make some magic. The website is the most important tool any brand can have. If it seems difficult to understand or navigate, then you’ve lost your audience, and you are most definitely losing out on business. Along with the website makeover, we also created a manual to help them manage it long-term.

As we gave the site a new look, we worked closely with SCS to schedule a photo shoot that would allow us to convey a more collaborative and consumer-friendly attitude through imagery. A picture really does say a thousand words, and we needed to make sure those words were fresh and aligned with the new messaging.

And finally, the hardest step: simplifying ALL of their content to make it rock solid. Let us tell you, that was one heck of a challenge but we LOVED it! We made it easy for anyone to understand their services: what they do and how they can help businesses. The best part? They now get to leverage the new foundation we have laid out for other projects, including digital and social media efforts.

We leave it up to you to judge our work. Check out SCS’ new website and let us know what you think!

Selfie Stick in Hand, Obama Reaches Millennials

By Miguel Piedra

Selfie stick. #YOLO. “Keeping it real.” That’s how this president rolls.

Since his election in 2008, President Obama has changed the game with a fresh approach when it comes to selling his agenda. From his “Between Two Ferns with Zach Galifianakis” appearance last year to delivering “The Word” on “The Colbert Report,” to his multiple visits to “The Daily Show,” the president and his team have shaken up the ways the presidential message is delivered.

And it’s paying off.

He’s fielded criticism for this unconventional approach. After all, he’s done everything from “Ask Me Anything” on Reddit, to Google Hangouts, to Twitter chats, and most recently he was interviewed by YouTube stars. It’s one hell of a diverse content marketing strategy. But at this point, the President has nothing to lose and can continue to take risks in marketing that could pay off in a big way.

Some call such tactics below the office, while others in the media establishment asked why he granted interviews to YouTube vloggers instead of more venerable journalists. But as Dan Pfeiffer, outgoing senior adviser to the president, told Bloomberg Politics, the president’s communication team understands that they “have to go where people are congregating.”

That’s today’s reality. Brands, just like the president, must search for platforms where their message is going to reach and connect with more people. BuzzFeed, for example, is one of most popular media platforms today, and Obama leveraged its power to get results for Healthcare.gov. Just hours after the grand debut of his latest viral hit — BuzzFeed’s “Things Everybody Does But Doesn’t Talk About” — the video has 21.3 million views and thousands of comments.

But it goes beyond that, too — the video has made Obama “one of us,” portraying him as accessible and relatable to the public. Putting him on a pedestal and distancing him from the people he represents won’t win people over or get anyone to sign up for health insurance.

That’s a lesson in how brands win. They have used intuitive ways to reach consumers. It’s all about authenticity and connecting with your audience where they are. In a society where the millennial mindset rules, you can’t try to sell anything to them. But here the president subtly sells his Healthcare.gov message. Obama’s video is an ad campaign that isn’t an ad campaign.

It’s the marketing machine of an administration that gets it.

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