A significant minority of IR departments is making the most of this social media tool
Most IR professionals are yet to be convinced that Twitter is worth the effort. Even so, there is plenty of IR-related activity taking place on the micro-blogging site. Various vendors and IR professionals meet each Thursday for a discussion, following each other’s messages via the hashtag #irchat.
In a separate development, increasing numbers of IR departments have also set up dedicated IR feeds, most of which are used to drive Twitter users to news on the company website. Twitter is also a place for instant reaction and comment on IR news, be it the latest survey results, SEC ruling or earnings leak from a corporate website.
Loyal following
It can be seen that the raw numbers of followers a tweet feed has, and the number of feeds it follows in return, tell only half the story of a feed’s reach; equally important is the relationship between the two. Put briefly, the more feeds a Twitter account follows, the more followers it is likely to have.
The large follower to following ratios of DellShares can be explained by its wide appeal as a large corporate feed. Beyond this, it is clear that while some feeds may not attract as great a following as others, their ratios are a better indicator of popularity than those that have more followers but lower ratios.
Now, let’s look at what some specific investor relations departments are doing. SAP is a prolific user of social media – like blogs, Facebook, SlideShare, YouTube and Twitter (@SAPinvestor) – to support and educate its various constituencies on its technology and products and, of course, its communications activities, including investor relations. SAP recently began using Twitter to support its investor relations program and to provide another source of outreach to investors. This includes notifications of product press releases, earnings releases, financial reports and attendance at conferences.
As another company at the vanguard of social media use, BASF has had an IR Twitter feed (@BASF_IR) up and running for over a year now. The feed is regularly updated, with new tweets appearing every four to five days. BASF does not aim to tweet once a day, however, as the company wants to focus on quality rather than quantity. The majority of the tweets contain links to the company website, leading to press releases, updates on earnings estimates, new presentations and publications.
Dell’s IR Twitter feed (@DellShares) is used not as a separate source of information, but to direct interested parties toward the company’s own dedicated IR blog, DellShares, which serves as the principal online platform through which the company communicates with its shareholders. Dell views the use of Twitter and other social media as an extension of its current communications policy.
In a final example, Rhonda Bennetto launched TVI Pacific’s Twitter feed (@tvipacific) as part of a wider plan to overhaul the company’s investor relations. The feed is updated every few days, usually with links to official press releases. This policy appears to be bearing fruit: until recently TVI Pacific’s investor base was almost entirely retail, but recent roadshows have revealed a growing institutional buy-side following that is better informed and keeping abreast of issues pertinent to the firm’s future.
Where work and waffles meet
A quick trawl through the ever-growing stream of IR-related tweets reveals the plethora of approaches professionals take to social media: pithy summaries of industry hot topics, considered opinions on breaking developments, handy links to in-depth discussions. These are a world away from the unceasing torrents of banal minutiae and internet memes with which private users pollute cyberspace.
Or so you would think. For a few IROs, however, the online boundary between public and private, confidential and corporate, has become somewhat blurred. As home and work mix, layers of industry comment and personal stories are piled on top of each other like a confused communications lasagne. And so, in the finest traditions of gentle fun-poking, IR magazine is proud to present some highlights from IR bloggers the world over, all thanks to Twitter.
- @AdamIRO – Is growing a moustache as part of the ‘Movember’ campaign to raise awareness of prostate cancer. Very commendable. Shame about the resulting ginger fluff.
- @darrellheaps – This poor soul has had terrible difficulty in training his dog. But never fear! The decidedly tweet-worthy haircut he acquired while in Philadelphia must have gone some way toward compensating for his poor canine control skills.
- @becktold – Not so much the interesting thoughts of an experienced IR professional as a shrine to sports at the University of Southern California. Go Trojans!
