Social Networking - The Open Doorway to Internet-Driven Business Success

A Template for Low-Cost, High-Impact Positioning Success

Ned Barnett

Introduction – What is Social Networking?

While content is king, Social Networking is not so much about content as it is about the conversation – and the relationship.

Regardless of your reason for getting involved, Social Networking is about creating a give-and-take which, in turn, creates a real – or at least a perceived – sense that the people who are communicating are actually creating relationships with the people who are being communicated to. This relationship building works because, using the technology of Social networking, the people on the receiving end have the opportunity to “communicate back” to the expert.

Despite the importance of Social Networking conversations and relationships, the vast majority of those on the receiving end don’t actually “communicate back.” However, knowing that they can communicate back gives recipients of Social Networking communications from experts, gurus and thought-leaders the illusion of a real-world two-way relationship between themselves and the expert on the other end of the Social Network.

It is no coincidence that Facebook and Twitter are set up to make it easy for followers (Twitter) or friends (Facebook) to contact or reply to the experts they choose to “friend” or follow – and it’s no coincidence that the best and most influential bloggers invite and allow comments in response to their blogs. Other Social Networking tools (DIGG comes to mind) allow people to vote on Social Networking blog posts, demonstrating their positive (or negative) reaction to a given post.

Too many executives and authorities who set themselves up to be self-appointed thought-leaders or topical gurus, who conscientiously populate the Internet with tidal waves of quality content, still don’t understand that Social Networking is actually all about the conversation, all about the relationship. They position themselves to present, but not to receive. They tweet or post, blog or comment from positions of perhaps well-earned authority – then wonder why they don’t have more followers.

Those with real followers routinely interact with their constituencies. In addition, they post items that don’t just demonstrate their expertise – their Social Networking interactions also create relationships with their followers and fans that will generate referrals and, in other ways, create long-term business benefits.

While relationships are the essence of Social Networking, “content” – the information which triggers the exchanges – is the basis for the interactions which create those relationships.

Creating and Re-Creating Content

While content is king, creating enough new and important content to remain relevant would be difficult and time-consuming – or would, except for the fact that the incredible and constantly growing variety of Social Media outlets allow your distinctive, original content to be repurposed for maximum reach and impact. For instance:

1. You can create a free-download eBook – a book-formatted (with a distinctive cover, paginated layout, as well as illustrations and other graphics) electronic document which doesn’t need to be longer than 36 to 50 pages (though it can be much longer) – that summarizes the key points you want to make …the points that really set yourself apart as a true thought-leader.

2. You can take that eBook and boil it down, editing it into a series of White Papers and Case Studies which can then be posted topically. Like eBooks, these White Papers and Case Studies should be laid out and paginated in book-like format, typeset and replete with graphic illustrations.

3. You can then create a series of blog-posts based on each of the White Papers and Case Studies. For example, I’ve recently created a White Paper from which we will pull no less than seven single-topic blogs, all based on that one White Paper. These blogs can be posted on a free-standing, topical blog-site, as well as in your Facebook Official Page (a.k.a., Fan Page).

Note: For each topic, the “core” blog should be posted on the website, with other postings (to Blogger or WordPress, or on topical blog-sites) should be rewritten – at least a little – in order to enhance their SEO value in promoting your core website.

4. You can create video blogs (some still call them vlogs) of the most important blogs, posting those on YouTube or on a private YouTube network you can create once you have sufficient video posts. The same content can be re-created and re-distributed by creating Podcasts, then hosting them on free-distribution sites such as Podbean.com or MyPodcast.com.

5. For each blog and video blog or podcast (as well as for the eBook and the White Papers and Case Studies which provide the source content for these spin-off content repackaging tools), you can create a series of “check this out” tweets and Facebook posts. In addition, you can link your Facebook and Twitter accounts, allowing you to double the impact of individual tweets or Facebook comments.

In this step-by-step process, all of the “content” presented to different audiences using different Social Networking technologies is based on a single source of in-depth, high-quality content. An effective eBook could keep you busy re-purposing and re-posting content for six months; a stand-alone White Paper can keep you busy for a month; a simple blog could keep you busy posting on Facebook and Twitter for a week.

If you take this approach, you can use support applications to pre-program your various postings for a significant time in advance, freeing you up to focus in the moment on breaking-news blogs, tweets and Facebook posts – ensuring that your fan-base of followers is treated to solid, useful content even when breaking news doesn’t offer new opportunities.

For instance, once per month I produce a series of “#PR Pro” tweets, then use a free tool, TweetDeck, to place them three-per-day at different times each weekday and once-per-day on Saturdays, ensuring that my followers receive at least sixty-four useful and original tweets per month, in addition to my more personal updating tweets, my retweets, my replies to others and my “check this out” tweets which I produce whenever I find useful third-party content I’d like to share. More on this below.

What’s the Use?

Effective and aggressive social networking outreach efforts can enhance existing promotion, publicity, marketing and advertising programs.

Alternatively, or in addition, an effective and efficient aggressive Social Networking campaign can be used as a low-cost, high-impact way of positioning a business (through the business’s public-face leader or leaders) as a thought-leader or industry-segment guru – and in doing so, open doors for business development: leads, referrals, inquiries, sales.

Even greater success can be accomplished when your Social Networking outreach effort seeks to accomplish several distinctive goals. This is because the volume of communications you undertake will almost automatically enhance the impact of each of your Social Networking outreach programs.

However, to accomplish this, several elements are necessary:

• Quality Content
• Consistency of Presentation
• Frequency of Presentation
• Integration of Presentation among Social Networking sites
• Promotion

By blending these factors together, your Social Networking outreach program can and will build followers, which in turn will lead to effective positioning as a thought leader/market niche guru.

Here’s How it Works

For any company or individual who wants to be seen as a leader or expert in a specific market niche, there is no more cost-effective means of achieving this goal than through aggressive and effective Social Networking.

To succeed, several steps must be first taken:

1. Make a strategic personal commitment to Social Media/networking success.

• As with most promotion efforts – such as positioning a company leader as a topic-authority media spokesperson – a commitment to the process needed to create success is a necessary prerequisite. For example, if you schedule a media interview, the person to be interviewed has to make “being there” for the interview a priority.

• By the same token, Social Media outreach – even when the actual copy creation is being handled by a skilled team of ghost-writing communicators creating those Social Networking messages for a C-level leader – requires a “right now” time commitment by that C-level leader (or by someone who can speak for and authorize communications on behalf of the C-level leader) to respond to comments and to engage in the conversation, which is necessary for building the relationship.

2. Identify a market niche – it’s difficult to be an expert in ‘everything’ (we can’t all be Donald Trump), but it is relatively easy to become an expert in a narrow-focus market niche. Specializing in being a generalist is not the way to become a thought-leader or guru. However, identifying a specific narrow-focused market niche makes it remarkably easy to be seen as a thought-leader – and if that market niche is important to potential clients, prospects, investors or other targets, then capturing leadership in that market niche is an important and useful business strategy.

3. Commit resources – compared to advertising, or even public relations, Social Networking is far less costly; yet, to succeed, it is vital to commit sufficient resources – time, access, some funding – to get the job done.

Sometimes, time (to approve content and placement tactics) is the most important resource; however, if a systematic approach is developed and implemented, then calendar time will no longer become an important resource.

Taken together, success in Social Media – just as success in media relations or any other coordinated and aggressive marketing communications program – depends on focus and commitment. Once that commitment is in hand, it is time to start shaping the program. A Social Networking program should include:

• Quality Content:

• The content should be narrowly focused – broad-spectrum “focus” dilutes the message and disrupts the process of attracting followers and turning them into advocates.

• The content should represent state-of-the-art thought in the narrow market niche on which you’re focusing

• The content should be well-written and well-presented – which means it should be edited and proof-read carefully (much of what’s out there in the Social Networking world is poorly-written – when it’s done right, it really stands out).

• Consistency of Presentation – content needs to be consistent in a variety of ways:

• Consistency of style – have a “voice” that is identifiable; one that people will get used to and seek out. For instance, Guy Kawasaki and Seth Godin, two prominent thought-leaders, have distinctive voices not likely to be mistaken for anyone else. This enhances their impact in the marketplace.

• Consistency of quality – too many so-called experts have irregular quality of presentation. Some of their posts are Pulitzer material; other posts are juvenile and amateur-hour. This erodes thought-leadership positioning. However, consistent quality reinforces thought leadership status and stature.

• Consistency of innovation – content that doesn’t either encapsulate and pull together diverse existing ideas or blaze new ground and new understanding is not going to capture and hold reader interest – and without reader interest, you’ll never be a thought leader or market-niche guru.

• Frequency of Presentation – Social Networking leaders are also reliably frequent communicators; they demonstrate a consistency of timing in their posts and comments, the frequency serving to keep their followers and fans engaged. “Out of sight, out of mind” absolutely applies to Social Networking. This doesn’t necessarily mean daily postings, but it does mean regular and frequent. However, “too consistent” can bespeak a robotic approach that will turn off followers.

• Integration of Presentation among Social Networking sites – active social networkers who are (or who intend to be) thought leaders or niche-topic gurus – tend to be multi-dimensional. For instance, they will have:

• A blog-site free-standing from their website; but, they also post their blogs on their website and on their Facebook page. The two leading free-standing blog-sites are Blogger – owned by Google and thereby searched frequently; and WordPress – which offers more formatting features, offering the potential of becoming almost a website.

Other sources for placing blogs include commentary and thought-leadership aggregators such as Huffington Post (on the Left) and Townhall.com (on the Right). In addition, in almost every broad market niche, there are topical blog aggregators which will welcome innovative, thoughtful and well-presented blog-posts.

• A Twitter account which is used to attract Twitter-followers to the blog-sites, website and other content sites.

• A Facebook account, including an Official Page (also known as a Fan Page), where Facebook friends can be recruited.

• If your topic is musical (but only if it’s music-related), MySpace remains a useful place to be; but other than music, MySpace has faded from prominence, especially when it’s related to business or positioning.

• A YouTube account, where video editions of blogs can be posted, along with testimonials and specially-developed videos, with links back to the website, the blog-sites, the Twitter account and Facebook. You can even create a YouTube “network” where all of your YouTube posts can be aggregated.

• Podcast distribution sites such as Podbean.com and MyPodcast.com provide the same service as YouTube, but for audio-only messages, which can include the audio portion of video blogs or audio-eBooks.

• Promotion – if you post a tweet in the electronic forest that is Twitter and nobody reads it, did you make an impact? Of course not. However, by proper use of Social Media, you can self-promote without ever leaving the Social Networking milieu, though promotion will work more effectively if it also includes more traditional means of promotion. Here’s an example:

• Write a blog that breaks new ground on a topic which is also breaking newsworthy. Post it on your blog-site. Find a topical-related blog-site and arrange to have the blog posted as a guest-blog. Make sure the information is out there, in several contexts.

• Seek out other blogs, written by other bloggers, on the same topic – go to these blogs and post comments which link your blog with theirs, and publish a hot-link back to your original blog.

• Tweet about the blog and provide a link; and post links to Facebook and on LinkedIn.

• Issue a press release on BusinessWire (or some other equivalent wire service), to ensure that the topic and the link to the blog is widely available on the Internet.

• Pitch the topic to news media – editors and reporters, talk show hosts and bookers, cable news hosts and producers.

This process of promoting blogs via Social Networking was used recently to book a series of 56 topical radio interviews and five related topical appearances on cable news programs. First, the blogs were posted and promoted – then, I pitched talk show bookers and producers, using the blog post as the “hook” (proving that I actually had something worth saying). So, done properly, this integrated promotion approach will maximize the impact and benefit of the Social Networking outreach efforts.

The Process – For Example …

Here is an example of how all of this information about Social Networking can be made to work, based on actual Social Networking campaigns.

o Create a point of view – settle on a market niche, a point of view and a specific insight or position on the selected topic.

o White Papers, Case Studies and eBooks – write and publish a ground-breaking long-form (3 to 10 pages for a Case Study, 10 to 25 pages for White Paper, 36 to 50-plus pages for an eBook) document, which – upon publication – becomes the core content. To have sufficient content to create an impact, frequency of publication is critical. So plan to publish an eBook every six months, or a White Paper once per month, or a Case Study once every other week.

Ideally, create an eBook and publish it, then pull from it three to six White Papers or nine to twelve Case Studies from the eBook, or some combination of White Papers and Case Studies based on the content of the eBook.

In addition to the Social Networking promotion noted below, issue press releases sent out via BusinessWire (the best of the commercial press release placement services) promoting the availability of the eBooks, White Papers and Case Studies. In these press releases, invite people to follow you, at least on Twitter and Facebook – but also on LinkedIn, MySpace of other Social Networking sites where you are active.

o Blogs – Write a series of blogs based on the long-form – two-to-three blogs from a Case Study, three-to-seven blogs from a White Paper, or from twelve to eighteen blogs (or more – depends on the length) from the eBook. Post these blogs at a rate of two per week.

In addition, or until the long-form content is available to be adapted, create from one to three other (typically shorter) blog posts, posting them on “off-days,” and focusing them on more currently-topical or breaking news topics.

Next, place your blog posts on your primary blog-site, as well as on your website and your Facebook page. In addition, seek out topical blog-sites and “guest-post” blogs there as well, to further your reach.

As noted, when posting additional locations for the same blog, each “echo” should be rewritten a bit, with a link back to the primary blog. This enhances the Search Engine Optimization (SEO) value of each blog. SEO, of course, is how you rise to the top of Google for specific key word searches most closely akin to your market niche.

The ideal is to post the source content on your website – this will become the reference point. Then the primary blog posted on your hosted blogging site – and all the secondary and tertiary blog-references, as well – will refer to the source content that lives on your website.

Finally, seek out others’ blogs on the same topics you’re blogging on – for all appropriate ones, add comments. Become part of the conversation at these other blog-sites, and also invite people to check out your blog, as well as to follow you on your Facebook page and on Twitter (at least).

Blog posts should also make abundant use of keywords, helping those who are searching for specific terms to find you. This cannot be overstated.

o BusinessWire – While BusinessWire (BizWire) is already considered an excellent way of reaching reporters, editors and producers by presenting them press releases designed and intended to trigger press coverage – in our opinion it is the most cost-effective way of doing this – thereby reaching your target audiences through the media as the communications intermediary.

However, BizWire now also serves as a way of reaching your target audience directly. Currently, Bizwire has contracts with more than 150 online news aggregators, such as Yahoo Business and MSN.com. This means that each BizWire release lives on the Internet and with a useful selection of key words included with the release, your news will be found by those using Google to find news and information on a given topic.

By promoting eBooks, White Papers, Case Studies and key topical blogs via BizWire news releases, you’re making sure that people who would search nowhere else will find your news. This approach is not widely understood – using it will give you a leg-up on your competitors for positioning as thought-leaders (or for any other business reason).

Find out more about this innovative use of BizWire here: http://pr-marketing2point0.blogspot.com/2010/11/press-releases-new-online-advertising.html

o YouTube – YouTube is, after Google, the second most-used search engine. As a tool for Social Networking, if used correctly, it is hard to beat.

There are several ways of using YouTube:

• Create your own YouTube network, where your videos can be collected and presented to your audiences.

• If you’re featured on a TV talk show or a TV news segment, obtain permission and post this on YouTube.

• Create video blogs – in essence, talk through the blog on camera.

• Post testimonials from others who validate your expertise in your chosen market niche.

• Create custom videos that reinforce your position.

• Promote everything you post on YouTube, using LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and – if the content is valuable, via a BizWire press release.

o Facebook – this is THE dominant Social Networking site in the market today; two years ago, it surpassed MySpace just as that once-dominant site suddenly and dramatically faded in influence. Facebook has the ability to create Official Pages (also known as Fan Pages) which are designed to allow you to communicate with thousands of fans and followers. Facebook can now be linked to your Twitter account, and you can also post blogs on Facebook. A Facebook site should be created with the same attention to detail and focus as a company website.

Facebook should include all blogs and other long-form content, and friends should be approached to promote your content-heavy outreach Social Networking communications efforts.

Facebook comments related to blogs or to core content (White Papers, etc.) are, in effect, micro-blogs; use them to advance the discussion and not just promote the blog itself.

As with Twitter, Facebook is an acquired taste – if you like the environment, you’ll use it more often. But remember, this is about business and positioning, so don’t use it as a family album or personal chat room – not if you want to be taken seriously as a thought leader.

o LinkedIn – if you’re a business executive, LinkedIn can provide a platform for building and strengthening existing business ties with your colleagues and peers. LinkedIn serves as something akin to an email listserv discussion group, but with more structure. If you’re on LinkedIn, promote your blogs and other content-heavy created documents to your peers here as well as in other locations.

LinkedIn has other purposes – with the right focus, you can present concepts to people on LinkedIn who are not in your network. It can be time-consuming, but the membership on LinkedIn is more business-oriented, as a rule, and useful in purely business outreach.

o Twitter – For each new content posting, plan to Tweet at least one promotional message, or as many as three messages (usually within the same day), promoting each eBook, each White Paper, each Case Study, each blog and video blog or other Social Networking content tool. If you can identify more legitimate Tweets, and as long as you don’t come across as too heavily self-promoting (or, heaven forbid, too commercially), then spread your Twittering posts over several days or weeks. However, to justify repetition, original “angles” for these Tweet posts is essential.

In addition to promoting each new content, post from one to three tweets per day offering useful, informative tips on the selected topic – the realm in which you wish to become a thought leader or market niche guru. These can be programmed in advance, using TweetDeck or other twitter-management system.

In addition, because Twitter is all about the conversation, post at least one new Tweet per day (three new Tweets per day would be much better) based on what’s going on right now, such as:

• Something going on in your life (it doesn’t have to be “personal” – for instance, talk about the foot of snow that’s shut down the city).

• A link to someone else’s blog, or an online news story, that you find interesting, useful or motivating (use www.tinyurl.com to shorten the link) this makes sure that you’ve got room in the tweet to “sell” the link as worth checking out.

• A re-tweet from someone else who you follow, typically with either an insight you share or a link to something you think your followers would find valuable.

• A response to someone you follow, reflecting on their insight, sharing a personal experience, etc.

It is important to be (and to remain) part of the conversation – this is an important part of building followers and keeping them.

As with Facebook, tweets related to blogs or to core content (the White Papers, etc.) are, in effect, micro-blogs; use them to advance the discussion and not just promote the blog itself.

Link Twitter to Facebook, so that tweets will also be read by your Facebook friends, and vice-versa.

Select key words and include them in your tweets, setting them aside in what is called “hash-tags” (words preceded by a hash-mark, such as #hashtag).

• Other Social Media – Podcasts, webinars, Internet radio networks, Internet TV networks – there are a variety of additional, specialized online Social Media distribution technologies which can be embraced. The key to these, as with the rest of Social Networking, is content. Content is king, and with content, you can effectively position yourself as a thought leader or market niche guru.

The Bottom Line

Social Networking can make a huge difference for an individual – who wishes to be seen as a topical thought-leader or market niche guru – or for a company which seeks a low-cost, high-impact way of improving its position in the marketplace. However, Social Networking doesn’t happen overnight, and while it’s all but free, it isn’t automatically easy. It requires someone who can and will find the time to create useful content, and to do so abundantly. It also requires someone who is persistent and consistent – who is prepared to stay the course, to keep at it until a breakthrough has been achieved.

These reasons make the case – especially for individuals who need to be positioned but who haven’t the time (or, perhaps, the writing skills) – for an expert to create the content and consistently post this onto Social Media sites. In business, politics and academe, ghost-writing (speeches, books, articles) for C-level executives has a long and honorable tradition, and that same tradition can be translated into Social Networking.

However, ghost-written or self-produced, Social Networking – for those ready to commit the time and personal resources – will prove to be transformative in terms of positioning and referral-development.

Ned Barnett – February 15, 2011

New Rules 2.0 Investor Public Relations

A Template for a Winning PR-IR Strategy

This “New Rules 2.0 Investor Public Relations” for a private or a public company is designed to guide either a privately-held or public company in dealing investor relations needs through effective use of PR, the business news media and the Internet. This plan builds on both my nearly three decades of effective investor relations and investor public relations experience, along with the “New Rules” approach to public relations and marketing developed by David Meerman Scott and Seth Godin, among others.

What this means is simple: New Rules 2.0 Investor Public Relations blends an innovative and aggressive implementation of a distinctive form of investor relations – IR outreach run along public relations lines along with a keen insight into how the emergence of social networking and social marketing on the internet can enhance Investor Public Relations, taking it to an entirely new level of successful implementation.

A key element of this “New Rules” approach is that social marketing is all about the conversation, the discussion, the free give-and-take of information, rather than the “hard sell” typifying both conventional IR and traditional PR. Top-down lecturing (the typical IR approach taken by most companies) does not work in the New Rules arena of the Internet. Facebook and YouTube invite comments; twitter demands discussion. To be successful, the company with investor relations aspirations needs to be part of that discussion.

The blending of the most innovative approach to conventional investor relations with the most aggressive and visionary use of the Internet sets New Rules 2.0 Investor Public Relations apart from all other approaches to investor relations.

This New Rules 2.0 Investor Public Relations plan, when executed, will ensure that either a public company or a private company (which may intend to become a public company) remains SEC-compliant. This plan will raise the IR profile of company and enhance the company’s position in the equity and investment markets.

The ultimate intent in this New Rules 2.0 Investor Public Relations program is to provide information to current and potential investors, as well as to the various investor marketplaces – primarily through the media and the Internet, but also through all other appropriate communications channels – that will lead to the legal and ethical growth of the stock’s value in the marketplace.

Under this plan, even the company’s PR activities which are primarily focused on product- or service-line promotion, business development – even image or issue management – will have an underlying IR purpose. The reverse is also true – in the age of the Internet, it is no longer possible to silo information programs for “just employees” or “just customers” – or even “just investors.” Investor PR communications will also reach clients and employees and regulators, and it is therefore essential that the programs themselves not be siloed off to “investor relations” and “public relations” and “social networking” service providers or internal divisions within the company – for maximum benefit and minimum blow-back, these programs must be integrated at both the management and implementation levels.

What follows are some overview strategies and tactics that can be used – and, properly implemented, will work – to help a private company attract the attention (or position itself to attract the attention of) investors, and for a public company to see its stock rise to its appropriate and market-determined value. New Rules 2.0 Investor Public Relations is investor relations, but with a twist.

New Rules 2.0 Investor Public Relations requires standard outreach tools which include formalized SEC RegFD-compliant press releases, media pitches and pitch-tip sheets, white papers and case investor outreach communications and targeted work with appropriate business and financial analysts. It also requires a parallel campaign making use of the technologies and tools of social networking, including facebook and twitter, YouTube and blogs, and a host of other technologies and tools. These must be integrated, conventional with social, to create a consistent message across media platforms and to reach and favorably influence the maximum possible number of clients and customers, influencers and investors.

However, effective New Rules 2.0 Investor Public Relations, especially for less well-known companies, must also involve a heavy dose of aggressive, brand-building public relations – PR programs that on the surface seemingly have little to do with stock prices or institutional investors, angels or VCs. However, below the surface, these brand-building PR programs are essential to overall investor relations success.

Before traditional and standard market-making or VC-attracting IR efforts can hope to work for smaller companies, these firms must first become better-known in the marketplace. In addition, when potential investors first show some interest, they’ve got to be able to find motivational information that will “sell the company” without crossing the investor inducement line. Positive information about products or services, as well as news of marketplace success, can be made to fill this need.

This initial New Rules 2.0 Investor Public Relations approach is designed to elevate a company’s media and marketplace “position” with key target audiences, including:

· Business and Financial Analysts who cover the market space

· Individual investors and potential investors – including, for private companies, angels and incubators and VCs of all kinds

· Institutional investors

· Referral sources and other influencers

· Business media pundits, including the growing number of influential online media (including blog media) pundits whose opinions and coverage of companies can dramatically increase public awareness, which is the first necessary step in effective investor relations programs

A strategy note: Every growth-oriented private company is a potential public company. It has been our experience that private companies with public company aspirations should, to the greatest extent possible, follow the SEC RegFD guidelines while still a private company. Adopting and following these SEC guidelines is recommended both for “just in case” reasons and because it will project the private company as more mature (and therefore more worthy of investment) by savvy angels, incubators, VCs and other “flavors” of private-company investment capital. This plan follows this bias toward compliance.

Website

Public and private companies need to have effective investor-oriented websites that provide a wide variety of information required (of public companies) by the SEC and desired by investors and potential investors. A useful example of a public company website (which we designed and implemented in 2006, and which has been maintained as an effective example of the kinds of information needed) can be found at the Patriot Scientific Corporation’s investor’s website: http://patriotscientific.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=40&Itemid=46.

In addition to what is found here in this sample page, additional information is needed, including:

· Case studies, White papers and eBooks

· Analyst reports

· Links to all favorable press coverage (also found on the company’s website press room, but duplicated in the website’s investor relations page)

In addition, the company website should include an “affinity group” section – a closed-panel social networking site (such as is offered under open source by BuddyPress) which will allow clients and constituents, as well as investors and potential investors, to communicate with the company (and the company with them) as well as with one another.

Why have this feature? Realistically, every public company and – ultimately – most private companies will spawn independent websites, blogs, bulletin boards and/or discussion groups which will critique the company (and which will be monitored by the company). By having an internal site which fulfills this function, the company can both more easily monitor the “chatter” and more plausibly participate in the discussion.

Analysts

Business and Investment Analysts can have a profound impact on potential investors, market makers, VCs and others. It is vital to find them and court them, then include them in the discussion. Databases such as Big Dough, while not inexpensive, are essential to finding the right analysts – the ones most likely to cover a company’s market space, the most likely to be enlisted as an ally in efforts both online and off-line to participate in the discussion.

With this information about analysts who can influence stock value or lay the groundwork for courting a VC or other investor, a company will be able to communicate (in a PR fashion, using PR tools) directly to the targeted analysts help build their awareness of the company and its news. The goal here is to put the company on their radar screens for the first time, and to show company as a viable candidate for future investment.

In addition to its other obvious benefits, for public companies, this approach will help to influence these targets to include company in their future Buy-Side research reports. In the event the company does a road show to the investment community, this groundwork with analysts may prove decisively helpful.

IR-Focused PR

New Rules 2.0 Investor Public Relations efforts will include both product/service-oriented and company performance (IR-focused) information.

Plan: The core of PR efforts – whether traditional or New Rules – for any company is built around a plan, which is an integral part of a larger strategic plan which includes business development, marketing, investor relations and issues management goals and objectives.

Some companies prefer detailed and polished strategic planning documents that will be shown to the board and shareholders, to private-placement or public-company investors, to banks or other third parties. Others, however, prefer a back-of-the-envelope plan – bullet-points that allow both company and its communications agency to know where they’re going, when they’ll get there, what it will cost and what success is likely to look like.

Implementation: No matter how big the plan becomes (in terms of activities), the plan should always include the following core activities:

1. An ongoing series of press releases (for release to the Web, as well as to specific reporters and editors) to carefully-selected targets.

2. An ongoing series of press pitches, which will be pushed into the world via email, making use of carefully-crafted media contact lists.

3. An ongoing series of phone pitches or even (when opportunity and need arises) face-to-face pitches with identified individual reporters and editors to generate highly-focused press coverage.

4. An ongoing series of efforts to create opportunities to have the company spokesperson featured as a guest on radio (NPR, Sirius Network, individual station and syndicated programs focused on business or on issues touched by the company’s business model)

5. An ongoing series of efforts to create opportunities to have the company spokesperson featured as a guest on Television (PBS, cable news, Cable business news, etc.)

6. A social media support strategy that will reinforce every press outreach with blogs, Facebook posts, tweets and – where possible – YouTube videos (and video-embedded “smart” press releases) to ensure full integration between conventional and New Rules PR and Investor PR efforts

7. An “Off-Broadway” media strategy, at least at first, seeking coverage early-on in second-tier and third-tier business, trade and investment media.

8. Create and implement an investor-focused media release distribution strategy – a “bread-crumbs” strategy designed to get the word out in the marketplace so that when prospective investors (including VCs and angels and others seeking out private investment opportunities) want to conduct their own due diligence – or who are just “shopping” for that next opportunity, they will find the company.

9. An ongoing series of activities to create opportunities for other media placements (through editorial calendars and focused “reconnaissance” of the media marketplace)

10. Insert key words into wire releases as well as blogs and other efforts to start the reinforce conventional public relations with the ongoing online social networking process.

11. Integrate conventional PR and social networking – using blogs, YouTube videos, Facebook posts, tweets and other online communications to extend the reach of each conventional PR effort

12. Reach individuals directly, over the web, via “news” releases

While “press” releases target media gatekeepers, “news” releases distributed via BusinessWire or other media distribution tools which have guaranteed placement agreements, allowing the company to reach directly to individuals via keyword searches: http://pr-marketing2point0.blogspot.com/2010/11/press-releases-new-online-advertising.html

13. A multi-market media tour (including both a “virtual tour” of reporters and editors in smaller or out-of-the-way markets, as well as in front of them in larger markets)

14. Search Engine Marketing using key words to attract interested individual investors, as well as investment decision-makers (useful for both public and private companies seeking investment funding).

15. Create a prominent position for the Spokesperson (as well as the company) on the wide range of online social media (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc.) to dramatically increase the company’s visibility when the name is Googled.

16. Positioning company spokesperson as “thought leader”

17. A weekly, bi-weekly or monthly press advisory document pitching series of new story angles reporters and editors will want to consider.

18. Integrating the Website into PR and Investor Public Relations goals – The company website needs regularly (at least weekly) updates of information that will enhance the Website’s utility.

19. A crisis communications strategy that will be standing by, ready to go on a moment’s notice.

20. An online market research strategy which will poll targeted audiences with from five to 20 questions, then create press coverage based on the findings. This is a very powerful tool to create media interest (the polling itself can generate online interest).

21. An ongoing plan to capitalize on media trends – putting the company spokesperson forward to provide commentary on all appropriate breaking-news stories.

Integration

To be effective in a competitive media and investment marketplace, New Rules 2.0 Investor Public Relations is, at the core, an integrated program that links traditionally-separate functions such as PR, IR, Marketing and Issues Management into a single co-mingled function that delivers investor support at every level while continuing to provide effective branding, business development, marketing and issues management functions.

Gone are the silos that limit integration – to win in the 21^st Century, integration must be the guiding principle of communications. This even extends to employee communications because, on the Internet, no message is private, and no communications effort is isolated.

Such an integrated plan includes:

· Effective, aggressive and technically competent compliance with both the letter and the spirit of all relevant SEC rules and regulations regarding the release of information by public companies. This is the foundational touchstone of all of effective New Rules 2.0 Investor Public Relations activities on behalf of the company.

· Public Relations integration into every “pure” Investor Relations press release. This needs to be done well before release, in order to ensure maximum PR impact (while maintaining full SEC compliance)

· Facilitating media distribution of all IR-focused, as well as all PR-focused, press releases. Even purely Investor-oriented releases will go to targeted market niche and mainstream business media (as well as to purely IR media) targets, including effective wire release distribution.

· Effective and aggressive press clipping service (at least capturing online clips) to monitor and evaluate both the PR and IR value/impact of all Investor Public Relations press releases

· Targeted e-mail outreach to the media, as well as to potential (and current) investors, highlighting company’s success – sticking to subjects already covered in SEC-compliance press releases and formal reports

What New Rules Investor Public Relations “Should” Deliver: There are a number of responsibilities of any investor public relations agency has to their clients:

1. Provide a range of services, such as strategic counsel, corporate governance counsel, SEC compliance counsel and shareholder relations counsel. To this is added specific communications training focused on the IR markets: Shareholders, funds managers, investment analysts, financial media and other key audiences.

2. Create – then distribute – as part of a broader investor relations program, specific IR-focused messaging designed to play well with both shareholders and investment analysts, with reporters and funds managers.

3. Aggressively seek out opportunities to (in a positive context) put the client’s name before analysts and financial media, as well as potential investors (critical for private companies as well as public companies) – this can be done via press releases, via one-on-one contacts or e-mail or phone pitches.

4. Advise and ensure that the client is in compliance with all appropriate public-information requirements promulgated by the SEC; and, whenever possible, to do more than the required minimum.

5. Effectively “crisis-manage” (in an IR context, as well as in a PR context) any blow-ups that impact the company, the shareholders, the board or other factors that might impact stock prices.

6. Maintain regular contact with potential investors, as well as to shareholders – as a group, as well as individually – including monitoring the “boards” when appropriate. Provide events support for annual meetings and other shareholder activities

7. Provide counsel on approaching specific markets – fund managers, side-sell facilitators, etc.

Investment Analyst Tour: An investment analyst/media tour (perhaps conducted separate from the PR-oriented business analyst/media tour recommended elsewhere) has real merit for both public and private companies seeking investors. While the two kinds of tours (media and analyst) serve largely the same purpose (though with different audiences), if budget is no consideration they should not be combined. However, if budget is an issue, combining them can be an effective use of available resources. For budgetary reasons, a media tour and an analyst tour can be successfully combined.

Shareholder Relations In addition to the online captive social networking site noted above – which is a hugely powerful tool for communicating with and relating to investors, online market research can be used to communicate with (and find out the concerns of) shareholders and other stakeholders. This will be built around a questionnaire that will be designed to give the company a profile – a useful “snapshot” – of the shareholders.

Shareholder Education: Shareholders (as well as potential investors) are typically unaware of company’s vision – informing them, helping them to see the benefits of this vision – that’s a key role for both PR and IR to ensure that shareholders or potential investors are “on board” – and to achieve that requires ongoing shareholder education.

Conclusion

In today’s increasingly-integrated communications media world – a world where the Internet is supplanting traditional media as the primary tool for reaching individuals – there is no room for a company seeking to enhance its investor relations for arbitrarily-separated functional silos – PR, IR, Marketing, etc. Instead, success will go to those companies which understand that an integrated Investor Public Relations approach is critical to their ability to reach investors.

This applies to private companies seeking venture capital every bit as much as it does to public companies seeking positive relationships with investors and potential investors, be they individual or institutional investors.

Ned Barnett

Barnett Marketing Communications

ned@barnettmarcom.com - 702-561-1167