Page 104 - Crisis Communication Practical PR Strategies

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The New Dynamics of Financial Crisis 85
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quarter, and can be filed weeks after the quarter’s end. An investor
who buys and sells within a quarter will never appear in a 13f filing.
Management should be familiar with various shareholder ID and
surveillance services. Some of these are offered free for Nasdaq listed
companies. Exchange-traded companies should maintain relations
with their specialists.

2. Seek constant feedback from investor audiences

The company should survey investors that participate in quarterly
earnings conference calls before and after these events. This is not
only a way to keep these presentations focused and relevant, but
reveals what kinds of questions investors might be asking. It also pro-
vides a precedent for gathering this kind of intelligence during crises.

3. Strengthen the IR portion of the website

The corporate website, as has been noted elsewhere in this book, is a
vital crisis management tool because it can quickly distribute persua-
sive information to widely dispersed audiences. This potential is real-
ized, of course, only if the company’s website is up-to-date,
content-rich and established as a trafficked shareholder and analyst
resource before a crisis hits. Financial audiences are accustomed to
working with IR portions of websites, assuming that they are robust.
What constitutes a robust IR website? At a minimum, it should contain
the following information:

welcome letter/shareholder letter;
review of the company’s growth strategies;
frequently asked questions;
past financial presentations, including replays of webcasts;
fact sheet;
stock price graph;
historical financials;
event calendar.

4. Policy statements on key topics

The IR department should have clear, written policies, suitable for
external distribution, related to trading by insiders, financial disclo-
sure, corporate governance and other issues.