Roar Media Co-Founders featured in M.O: “Success requires a healthy balance of creativity and good old-fashioned common sense.”

Jolie Balido & Jacques Hart
Co- Founders

Roar Media

Roar Media combines traditional media relations with advanced Internet marketing programs, including social media and search marketing, to help clients worldwide achieve their business goals. Their results-driven approach and seasoned team of professionals deliver practical, innovative programs that work.

 Jacques Hart is co-founder and CEO of Roar Media, an integrated marketing-communications and digital-communications consultancy. He specializes in helping traditional companies transform their legacy business operations and marketing programs into next-generation platforms that help increase market share, conversions and revenues.

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Jolie Balido, president and co-founder of Roar Media, is a nationally known marketing-communications professional and media strategist with more than 15 years of experience helping corporate, governmental and individual clients    worldwide achieve their business goals.

MO: How did you meet and what inspired you to launch a business together?

Jolie & Jacques: We were introduced by business colleagues at a Miami Beach karaoke event in 2000. Over the years, we stayed in touch and found that our skill sets complemented each other, as Jolie comes from the traditional PR and communications field and Jacques comes from the digital field. Together, we recognized that there was a real business and consumer need for “earned media” in terms of practical, innovative marketing-communications programs that combine traditional PR and communications strategies with advanced Internet marketing strategies.

MO: Why does successful Internet presence require much more than a website?

Jolie & Jacques: A website is like a baseball stadium – without players and fans, there’s no game. At Roar Media, we believe that just because you “build it” they won’t necessarily come to “visit it.” As a result, we spend a considerable amount of time and energy in developing our clients’ new business acquisition formulas, so that when their websites are completed, we have developed a unique value proposition to stimulate demand and attract site visitors. Before we launch new websites, we have prepared all the right ingredients to attract and engage site visitors from day one.

MO: Your Company was originally founded in 2005 as MediaLine Marketing Communications. What inspired you to rebrand as Roar Media in 2005? What was the transition process fairly smooth or were there some hiccups along the way?

Jolie & Jacques: We were inspired to rebrand the company because we recognized an opportunity to serve an unmet need for high-level strategic counsel. Many of our clients are traditional companies, but they’re looking for an agency that’s forward thinking. When we considered our competition, we found that most firms used old, crusty methods of communications. We came up with the name “Roar Media” while on safari in the Serengeti. The transition was a smooth, natural process and we found no hiccups – only growth and a lot of fun along the way serving our clients!

MO: How can a business cultivate an impressive “digital handshake?”

Jolie & Jacques: A good handshake comes from your level of engagement in the community both with corporate and civic partners as well how these experiences are expressed via your own personal and corporate social media channels. Of course, a handshake is just the beginning of a long-term relationship that must be nurtured and maintained.

MO: What are some effective, no-nonsense strategies and tactics to help top salespeople and executives establish their thought-leadership?

Jolie & Jacques: Establishing thought-leadership requires developing a solid messaging and positioning platform as well as a strong platform of meaningful information that will bring value to your audiences. Then, we must deliver those messages with the right frequency throughout all touch-points, including the news media, white papers, industry conferences, social media, websites, face-to-face, etc. We know that professionals are busy, and we help them hone their message and the platform to deliver it.

MO: Can you talk about how Roar Media has played a key part in raising awareness and influencing policy for one of your clients? Is your approach or strategy any different when working on a project that has more social impact than a traditional marketing campaign?

Jolie & Jacques: Our approach for every project is different. After critically analyzing the client’s stance in the market, we apply a strategy that combines traditional media relations with advanced Internet marketing, including social media and search marketing, to help our clients achieve their business goals. In developing this unique strategy, we keep in mind that success requires a healthy balance of creativity and good old-fashioned common sense to ensure our programs are not only innovative but also practical and will work to deliver meaningful results.

Of course, we are passionate about social impact projects in which our involvement plays a role in creating and rethinking policy decisions. Our work raising awareness of the problem with toxic Chinese drywall that was negligently installed in thousands of homes in Florida is widely credited with influencing policy decisions and helping homeowners gain the governmental and legal support they need in order to obtain the compensation they deserve for the losses they’ve suffered. This program included media relations, website development and social media.

Below is a link to a case study that was performed on Roar Media’s involvement in the Chinese drywall catastrophe.

Link to case study