Can you integrate public relation effort into Investor Relations?
Investor Relations (IR) is a specific subfield of public relations that revolves around how a
company communicates with investors, shareholders, government agencies, and the financial
community.
Investor relations activities must be tightly integrated with the company’s accounting
department, legal department, and senior executives such as the CEO, CFO, and COO. Investor
relations are also subject to more regulatory requirements than standard public relations due
to financial and legal requirements imposed by the governments.
Investor Relation Vs Public Relation
The main difference between investor relations (IR) and public relations ( PR) is that IR deals
with internal relations, while public relations is the communication between the company and
the public. Similarly, investor relations involve managers and employees, while public relations
impact other stakeholders such as customers, communities, and associates.
What is Public Relation?
Public relations is a strategic communication process that businesses, individuals, and
organizations employ to build mutually beneficial relationships with the public. Public relations
is a strategic process that manages the dissemination and distribution of organization-related
information to the public in order to maintain a favorable reputation for the organization and
its brand. This process is executed in the following way-
•What information needs to be disclosed?
•How should it be written?
•How should it be published?
•What media will be used to disseminate information?
Purpose of Investor Relations
Investor relations ensure that a company’s shares are traded fairly through the disclosure of
material information that allows all investors to assess whether a company is a good
investment destination or not.
The best time to hire an investor relations firm and start building an investor relations team is
when a company is planning an IPO or going public with a corporation with a Companies should
not wait for an S-1 filing (to register an IPO intent) to start thinking about investor relations; An
investor relations program should be developed from the outset in parallel with the IPO
process.
Investor relations is an extremely important part of a publicly traded company’s
communications program, both for compliance purposes and to build relationships with the
investment community. If managed well, a company not only meets all legal requirements but
also builds excellent relationships and trust with top investment and financial analysts.
How can you Integrate Public Relations with Investor Relations?
•Ensure IR and PR learn from each other – Before developing a plan or sending
communications, it is essential that public relations and investor relations professionals
understand the functions of other departments and how they differ from each other.
•Sync your IR and PR calendars – It becomes important for investor relations and public
relations departments to sync up their calendars if they haven’t done so far.
•Be consistent with the storytelling – It would be good for IR and PR to showcase a
united face for any type of news that could impact business. Their messaging needs to
be aligned, and one side may need to consult with the other to refine it so that any
statements made publicly put the company in the best light possible.
•Make decision-making a group effort – Investor relations and public relations are
responsible for making important decisions, sometimes daily or even multiple times on
the same day. You ensure that the messages of both departments are consistent and in
line with what the other department say.