20 Social Media Strategiesfor Public Companies

20 Quick Tips for IR, PR, or SocialMedia Marketing for Public

Companies

By www.publishknowledge.com

October 1 2009

Internet & Investor Relations

Investor Relations has grown to a multi-billiondollar industry in combination with theinternet. The compensation for servicesrelated to the attraction and communicationto shareholders often surpasses executivecompensation as companies strive to increasetheir liquidity and the attractiveness of theirfirm for large scale investors.

OTCBB and Pinksheet Companies

Over the counter bulletin board andPinksheets have been a positive place to takea firm public for both domestic andinternational companies due to the highliquidity which makes it easier to finance acompany and also to exit those shareholderswho have been invested into a company overthe long term.

Don’t Jam The System

The answer is that the very principles behindSocial Media Marketing is based on building arelationship, permission based following, andetiquette. How can you combine social mediamarketing into your business model for publicrelations, follow a social media business plansuch as:

Have a Blog

Have a blog built for your firm, such aswww.otclistings.com (One can be set-upinitially for free with a small monthlymaintenance fee and you can begin updatingthe blog or hire a person to do it on behalf ofyour company)

Blog Integrates with Traditional

• Automate your press releases topublish on the blog

• Automate your newsletter topublish on the blog

Blog Integrates Continued

• Automate investor notices, proxy notices, filings,etc, to be published as notices on the blog

• Write one blog a week and post it within yourblog on why people are investing in your industry,what is going on in the industry, all of the successstories in the industry and why you compare.

• Set-up a Twitter account, every time you publisha press release, newsletter, notice, or post,paraphrase the title and twitter the title with alink to the website


• Read some of your followers comments, andinteract via twitter by asking them why theydecided to follow your firm, and do they have ablog, etc. Create interaction. Use the twitteraccount for the marketing people and travelingexecutives to, so that you can twitter “our CEO isin Florida today speaking at a conference” or “Iam at the Hard Assets Conference in Las Vegasthis weekend, who else is going” etc. By puttingin the personal touches, updates, and personallocation, the followers have a genuine feeling ofwho they are reading and why.


• Spend 1 hour a day at least updating the blogand twitter account, so that the market gets acontinued feeling that you want tocommunicate with them. Never go silent forlonger than a week, it is a bad sign, like notsending out a press release. We are all awareof the cost of a press release, and thecompanies limiting how much and how oftendue to budgets, but social media is free, thecompany has no excuse.


• Ensure research reports written on your firminclude the blog and twitter account in thecompany profile

• Inform people of your blog in investorpresentations, corporate presentations, etc.

• Develop a press release related to your socialmedia marketing campaign, and inform theinvestors of all the places they can follow yourfirm online.


If you hire any investor relations firms, make sure theynotify people of the blog and twitter account to follow,but also make sure they are not spamming it to peopleor else you will lose followers and market respect.

That’s my queue for a pitch, [email protected] for Mark Bragg to buildan strategy that suits regulation FD and complies withcurrent publication regulations and use of the internet.

Other Mediums

• Utilize newsgroups, discussion forums, andtargeted postings to discuss your blogs, free anduseful information, and why they should followthe company profile, blog, twitter, etc. Leave linksto all of the mediums you are using and try toparticipate within the groups once a week, or theday of posting, whichever is sooner. This way,your forums become defacto followers of yourcontent, but ensure you are commenting onrelevant information to the groups and not justspam posting.

Youtube and Video Blogs

Utilize youtube for loading up video’s ofcorporate presentations, talking heads aboutthe most current press release launched byyour CEO or executives, etc. Blog the contentwith a link to the video, twitter its publication.

My favourite is simply reading your pressreleases and blog aloud and posting them.

Twitter

• Encourage your executives to sign-up for twitter accountsand update their accounts with links to your press andposts, or have them retweet your tweets as employees andexecutives of the company. Ensure there is a policy in placeas to what executives can and cannot discuss as ultimatelythe SEC is very clear about the liability of what employeessay online falls upon the company. For example, they canpost links to press, but can not discuss price of the share,how much money the company has, etc, unless its withinthe filings, and even then, it has to be in a capacity of notadvice. Best to have them use it socially and randomly postinto their “personal” profile a link to press here and there.

Twitter Continued

• Put your twitter and blog account information in your presscontact information for press releases

• Put the blog and twitter links on your company website• Send out a newsletter to your current base of contacts

informing them of the new blog and twitter accountfollowing your firm, and continue to do so at the footer ofyour emails, newsletters, etc, so that individuals begin tofollow your firm there.

• Ensure research reports written on your firm include theblog and twitter account in the company profile

• Put the Blog, Twitter, and Facebook group in filings assources of information. (Helps legitimize future eProxyuses)

Before Launching Make Sure YouHave....

• Prepared the content for blogs and press• Set-up all the accounts, post content preprepared• Interlink the accounts once they are all set-up• Integrate into website and blogs• Automate as much as possible• Set-up tracking tools, and spreadsheet to measure

results• Insert a method into all tools for collecting emails and

contact information of followers/friends/usersFor tracking tools and templates please contact [email protected]

What would we suggest using.......

• Set-up an account at all the live chat softwares, AIM,MSN, Yahoo, Skype, Gtalk, Ichat, and have your IRPerson on this software or an outsourced one tohandle immediate incoming questions. Post the IDs inyour blog, network, contact us page.

• Set-up Twitter, Hootsuite, Twitpic, account so you canmanage multiple twitter accounts, track, and engage.

• Set-up Facebook Account, Events, and Groups – Usethe Group or Corporate page functions, don’t make apersonal account that ends up being a company, that ischeese...

What we suggest continued...

• Set-up Bebo for micro blogs, Video/Audio Distribution, integrateBebo with facebook, twitter, etc. Basically republish summaries oflarger existing blogs and press to link back to your corporate blog,enforce with messages and tweets onto your twitter account andfacebook.

• Fastpitchnetworking.com is decent for networking in a targetbusiness market, integrate applications on twitter, facebook, andblogger. Utilize for distributing video, micro blogs, etc. Build theaccount up the same way that the other accounts are done.

• Utilize NING to build a community with the social networkingevents of Polls, voting mechanisms, comments, etc.

• Gather.com is an excellent hub for publishing information, Gatheralso offers a percentage of advertising to the authors. Post releasesin PDF and word docs, PowerPoint Presentations. The moreformats the better.


• LinkedIn Best for integrating all of the other modules.Really its a list of connections, very useful for individualcredibility of Directors, Officers, and staff, not reallycompanies.

• Myspace.com A good publication tool with an internalnetwork for promotions that would help the company berecognized, i.e. a banner exchange. (MUST Set-up)

• NING – I bring NING up again as it really is one of the besttools for integrating into blogs, websites, and communitiesto drive users to a social media product.

• Orkut and google Talk- Google is one of the largestnetworks of users in the world. Good for SEO, Publishing,Chatting.


• Blogger.com is integrated. I suggest having at least oneblogger account and update with blogs from your mainblog. They could be micro blogs that point people overto the full content on the website.

• Slideshare.com For power point presentations andPDFs.

• Typepad.com free blog software, you should considersetting it up. It adds to the overall exposure and we canlink it back into your other blogs and websites. Canpublish the publishing of others on it as well; and newaccounts.


• Wikia and Wikipedia Good definition and publication websites, itbuilds a profile for your company as it grows and or states the storyand history.

• Meet-up Accounts is a useful tool for organizing events, one coulduse the tool for example to promote a Meet-Up within aconference. For example in a Gold Conference, a meetup.comaccount could be set-up for a specific event organized by your stafffor your company, of which people register to go to within theevent itself.

• Wordpress Website- The best darn blogging software for SEO andease of use for your social media marketing and IR Team. (Thatsour opinion but millions agree by using them.

If you want to launch a 20 step program to for your overallinvestor relations strategy contact [email protected]

OTC Listings Marketing

Some of the marketing services offered

1. Online research report writing once a month2. Industry reviews including your company3. Audit of sources of information on your company monthly for the CEO and CFO

to have full confidence in their internet disclosures and company policies beingfollowed before signing off on filings.

4. Press release reviews and opinions and social media integration5. Broadcasting company information, similar to a newswire but via blogs6. Interlinking of social media platforms and continued updates on behalf of the

company on all mediums when a press release occurs or notice, versus your firmmanually maintaining the process

7. Corporate competitions and marketing to build newsletter databases8. Building Broker dealer, Press, and Capital firm contacts and followings9. Syndicate development for combined posting, discussions, and communication

online with other social media experts10. Building a social media marketing plan for your firm using the twenty strategies

discussed.

What does it mean for PublicCompanies?

If you are not public yet and would like to considergoing public, contact Mark Bragg @[email protected] or go to www.otclistings.com andfill in the form in the top menu.

We have contacts with firms who engage in activitiessuch as IPOs, Reverse Mergers, Shell Transactions byway of Reverse Mergers, OTCBB Shells for sale by wayof purchasing control. In addition, we have trustedlegal counsel who can work with you for filings andregulation compliance when using the internet, whichwe call the Internet Audit. Feel free to contact us.