Greetings again. In the matter of raising visibility for your
company, there are numerous ways you might achieve this goal from
philanthropy to arranging for members of your corporate team to speak
at IT conferences.
The scope of your philanthropic efforts would depend on the size of
your budget. Because your trade in Internet security and information
technology, you might consider offering an IT scholarship at a
university. Sponsoring a student (especially from a disparaged
situation) would create a bevy of PR possibilities as well as
assisting young people to receive an education that might not
otherwise have the financial resources for continuing education. This
could also be done in conjunction with a nationally known support
organization such as Big Sisters or Big Brothers, or on a state high
school level (your state of residence) in the form of a "future tech"
competition of some sort. Scholarships are a wonderful way of support
and a great manner in which to gain recognition for corporations, and
to show investors that you are investing in furthering the knowledge
of young minds.
Another manner along the same line would be to offer grants to
learning institutions for the inception of educational programs
dealing with your services. In my community, there is an
internationally known product provider that recognizes area teachers
each year and awards them with money to use in improving their
students' learning experiences. The company does this in order to
give back to the community and to improve educational standards.
Aside from scholarships and grants, your company might also consider
creating internships for graduating IT students. The program has
created enormous goodwill in our area.
To gain visibility among corporate peers, I would suggest you arrange
for members of your team to give talks at IT conferences and at
conventions made up of those businesses that would benefit from your
products and/or services. By widening your scope to conventions
outside IT, you would gain interest from possible future customers.
Let’s say you did sponsor a scholarship – you could then branch into
the area of giving convention seminars on how you structured your
support of the future workforce. This type of presentation would work
for all types of educational and corporate conferences, and all the
while your firm’s name would be presented to more and more future
investors. Also, consider hooking up somehow with IT publications and
offer them free copy concerning IT and security isses. In some
instances, publication space might have to be purchased but smaller
publications might welcome an "ask the security expert" type of
goodwill column.
While all the above goes hand-in-hand with investor relations, I would
suggest you have a highly visible Internet presence through a
no-nonsense web site that addresses investor relations. Because of
situations like those of Enron, investors want to have access to all
the information they can when their money is involved. An example of
the clarity in which you could inform investors may be viewed at
http://www.microsoft.com/msft/ I would suggest being as visible as
possible to your current investors and for your future ones. Also,
that search yielded many corporate IR sites so you may want to peruse
a few to see how other corporations handle their Internet
presentations.
I also found a few organizations dealing with investor relations using
that general key phrase – you may want to consider joining one or
more:
National Investor Relations Institute (NIRI)
“a professional association of corporate officers and investor
relations consultants responsible for communication among corporate
management, the investing public and the financial community. With
over 5,000 members in 35 chapters around the country, NIRI sets the
highest standards in education designed to advance the practice of
investor relations and meeting the growing professional development
needs of those engaged in the field.” “An uncommon value, NIRI offers
an extensive professional development program including seminars on a
wide range of topics to create and enhance professional competence
among members. Each June NIRI's annual conference attracts a full
third of the membership.”
Investor Relations Society
“Europe's leading professional body for corporate officers and
consultants. The Society's mission is to promote excellence in
investor relations and enhance corporate value through effective
communication.”
I welcome additional clarifications from you on this question because
your inquiry covers a broad range of possibilities. Any specificity
you can offer me about your needs will further enhance my answer.
SEARCH TERMS and LINKS:
investor relations [Google search]
://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&ie=ISO-8859-1&q=investor+relations
Microsoft Investor Relations homepage
http://www.microsoft.com/msft/
National Investor Relations Institute
http://www.niri.org/
IR on the net
http://www.ironthenet.com/wipdefault.asp
IR counsel from IR on the net
http://www.ironthenet.com/serviceshome.asp?searchType=2&category=IR+counsel
Investor Relations Society
http://www.ir-soc.org.uk/index_flash.htm |
