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Sharecare and WCG Join Forces to Launch Healthcare Industry’s First-Ever Analytics-Powered Digital Engagement Platform

WCG

(Atlanta, GA, and San Francisco, CA – November 1, 2011) – Sharecare, an interactive social Q&A platform, and WCG, a market-leading digital communications agency, today announced a partnership service, SharecareNow, powered by WCG. As the healthcare industry’s first digital platform, SharecareNow, powered by WCG offers real-time analytics on patient healthcare trends, conversations and key online influencers. Through these insights, consumers, physicians, health and wellness brands and healthcare organizations will have more meaningful online conversations on Sharecare and throughout the web.

The service offers clients access to a suite of tools, research and social media analytics to identify the channels, conversations, authors, article sources, themes and terms most relevant to healthcare brands and organizations online and in real-time.

“WCG shares our mission to help transform health through greater information sharing and engagement,” said Jeff Arnold, chairman and chief architect of Sharecare. “Together, we realized it wasn’t enough to simply create a social service for health and wellness brands. We had to add the critical analytics component to identify who is participating in and driving the conversations relevant to these brands, and how to talk with these authors or organizations. This is what we have created in partnership with WCG.”

Through a dashboard interface, health and wellness brands and leading healthcare organizations will be able to monitor online and social media activity, create relevant content and educate consumers through a targeted engagement strategy. The SharecareNow, powered by WCG platform also ensures that engagement between patients, caregivers and health and wellness brands complies with FDA- regulated communication requirements for pharmaceutical, medical device and diagnostics companies.

The partnership brings together Sharecare’s foundation in providing trusted, expert healthcare content and advanced technology infrastructure with WCG’s industry-leading social media analytics and healthcare communications experience.

“In today’s online environment, patients and caregivers are inundated by misinformation, much of which is spam content found on unreliable blogs,” said Bob Pearson, Chief Technology and Media Officer of WCG. “By combining Sharecare’s trusted health and wellness expert network and content with WCG’s industry-leading social media analytics, SharecareNow will help top healthcare organizations navigate this noise and confusion through unparalleled data and insights, and find the precision necessary for them to help people lead healthier lives.”

As part of this important collaboration, Sharecare and WCG will also publish the “SharecareNow 10” – individually ranked lists of the top 10 online influencers within various health and wellness topics. These influencers may range from physician, patient and caregiver bloggers to reporters and medical contributors at national publications. The lists will be published online and will cover a broad spectrum of conditions, ranging from diabetes to allergies to fibromyalgia to women’s health.

About Sharecare

Launched in 2010 and based in Atlanta, GA, Sharecare’s mission is to greatly simplify the search for high-quality healthcare information and answer the world’s questions of health. Created by Jeff Arnold and Dr. Mehmet Oz, in partnership with Harpo Studios, HSW International (NASDAQ: HSWI), Sony Pictures Television, and Discovery Communications, the Sharecare interactive social Q & A platform allows people to ask, learn and act upon questions of health and wellness. The company’s innovative approach provides a wide array of expert answers to each question ranging from hospitals to MDs to non-profits to healthcare companies to active health consumers, ultimately creating a community where healthcare knowledge is built, shared and put into practice.

About WCG

Led by Chairman and CEO Jim Weiss, WCG is an independent company focused on integrated corporate and product marketing and communications for some of the world’s leading companies, with offices in San Francisco, New York, Chicago, Washington, D.C., Austin and London. Over the past 10 years, WCG has received numerous industry awards, including “2011 Digital Agency of the Year,” and “2011 Global Healthcare Agency of the Year.” WCG currently works with more than 60 of the top healthcare brands worldwide, from pharmaceuticals and medical devices to overall corporate presence. The company’s seasoned professionals specialize in social media analytics, online strategy, branding, design, digital and traditional marketing, corporate and product PR, media, investor and advocacy relations, clinical trial recruitment and grassroots direct-to-patient communications campaigns.

For more information, please visit http://now.sharecare.com and www.wcgworld.com

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