With more social robots entering different industries such as educational systems, health-care facilities, and even airports, it is important to tackle problems that may hinder high quality interactions in a wild setting including group conversations. This paper introduces a footing framework that allows the robot to assign conversational roles, which include addressee/addresser, bystander, and overhearer, for multiparticipants in an interaction. Accordingly, the robot adjusts its gaze pattern as a social cue that indicates that it has understood these roles. A pilot study was conducted to evaluate the effect of having this footing framework on the group affiliation and perceived social intelligence of a social robot.