IR Best Practices and Advisory

IR Plan and KPIs

A GuideLign member was looking to create a formalized Investor Relations plan and shift from being busy to being strategic. With a new IR team taking over, they wanted to create and paper a formalized strategy, utilizing best-in-class practices, and structuring measurable KPIs to track their performance. Our GuideLign Advisory team worked with the investor relations team to analyze what was and was not working with their current IR approach, identified current challenges for the team, and analyzed the current investor base in order to structure a tactical step-by-step approach to all the crucial elements of investor relations including: Setting up an IR Calendar, Guidance, Targeting, NDRs & VNDRs, Internal vs. External Communications, Activism Preparedness, and more. The advisory team set up KPIs for the investor relations team to track success against these initiatives, which the investor relations team used in quarterly board updates, providing more transparency into the IR team’s work and giving the team a “seat at the table.”

Earnings Process

A GuideLign member reached out to us with concerns about their earnings process. They felt that their process lacked structure, with minimal scheduling and unclear roles and responsibilities. This led to a scattered approach that was not strategically optimized. Our GuideLign Advisory team conducted a peer analysis of earnings releases and processes to identify best practices and areas for improvement. Our team helped them develop a structured four-week process, clearly outlining roles and responsibilities for each element of the process. The revamped earnings process led to a more cohesive and strategic approach, with clear scheduling and defined roles.

Earnings Call

One GuideLign member was interested in revamping their earnings calls. They felt like their current format had become stale and could use a facelift. Their first step was to identify what characterizes a best-in-class earnings call. GuideLign was one source they turned to for an in-depth and objective understanding of what the buy-side values most during a call. Our data allowed the IRO to draft a set of recommendations for management that was based on fact, not just a hunch. As a result, they reduced the total number of speakers presenting during the call, thereby reducing the overall time allocated to presentations. This allowed more time for Q&A, which aligns closely to what the buy-side prefers.

Shareholder Targeting

A GuideLign member reached out looking for a new approach to shareholder targeting and engagement. The regular reports their vendor was providing did not yield the results they were looking for, and they wanted to expand outside of the traditional industry peer group they’d been looking at to date. Through our proprietary analysis, our GuideLign Advisory team worked with the investor relations team to optimize their current targeting funnel, identify the white spaces, and identify and create a capital peer group based on 30+ fundamentals to identify similar equity stories, as well as the strongest points of company differentiation. After optimizing and revamping the targeting funnel, our team worked with the Company to develop a 4-8 quarter engagement plan as well as high-level messaging curated for each of their individual audience groups.

Non-Deal Roadshows

A GuideLign member reached out to Rivel via our client gateway and asked how often IROs are setting up their own NDRs. We were able to provide some data that the member found helpful and also put out a Rapid Action question on their behalf. Within 48 hours, we received 63 responses to their question and were able to provide valuable insight to the IRO.

Guidance Practices and Revisions

As a result of one member's interest in understanding how companies were planning to change their guidance, Rivel conducted a Rapid Action survey among more than 300 IROs over a three-day period. The results helped members compare their future guidance practices to other companies, ultimately offering some peace of mind.

A Rivel advisory client had a pending acquisition with an uncertain closing date, and therefore, the client did not know how to handle financial guidance on their upcoming earnings call. The client asked if they should suspend guidance entirely, change the type of guidance and provide fewer metrics, or delay updating guidance until they had further assurance of the deal closing date. Our GuideLign Advisory team provided the range of possible outcomes on the various approaches under consideration, which assisted the client in arriving at a final decision regarding the guidance they would provide on their next earnings call.

Board Communications and Reporting

On a check-in call with a GuideLign member, they mentioned that our most recent investor day report from the investment community armed her with answers to questions she faced from her board specifically about the topic. "I use your research in a few different ways, but one example in particular is that I read your investor day report prior to my board meeting. Without notice, the board asked several questions about investor days, and because of the report, I was able to answer all their questions." Going forward, she is going to "arm" herself with our data by reading through larger reports that GuideLign publishes before board meetings.

IRO Peer-to-Peer Expertise Sharing

A GuideLign member was recruited to head up a new IR department for an upcoming IPO. The member reached out to the GuideLign team and inquired whether we could ask the membership some questions and make any connections to people who have gone through an IPO or spin-off. We posed a few Rapid Action questions and were able to connect this member with those respondents who have had experience taking a company through a similar transaction.

Another GuideLign client received a meeting request from an activist investor, which the client’s CEO and CFO repeatedly declined. We introduced the client to a fellow GuideLign member who had been through an activism campaign. He shared advice on working with an activist and the potential ramifications of management refusing to take a call from an activist investor.

Management Transition

The long-time CEO of a Rivel client was retiring, with her successor to be promoted from within after serving as head of the company’s largest business unit. The successor had no IR experience and had never interacted with the investment community. The IR team needed to rapidly onboard the incoming CEO as seamlessly as possible, including IR coaching and Reg FD training, as well as introduce him to the investment community. Our GuideLign advisory team worked with the IR team to help develop a communication plan, including the timing of the announcement and how to message the promotion from within, along with brainstorming answers to the possible questions that would be asked and possible market reactions. The advisory team also offered executive coaching and Reg FD training to the incoming CFO. This custom advisory work was supplemented by best practices research on CEO and CFO transitions from our Intelligence Council.

IR Vendor Review

A GuideLign member recently shifted from FP&A to being the lead IRO of their company. Given that they had little to no experience working with IR vendors, they asked us to provide a review of their current vendors to get a better understanding of what each vendor provides, how to best leverage them and identify vendors that may no longer be needed. One of our GuideLign Advisors was able to provide this member with feedback based on their 30+ years of experience working with various IR vendors. This feedback, coupled with benchmarking data from our Intelligence Council, helped this member make informed decisions to cut costs and optimize their IR vendors.

Staffing

As passive investors become more prevalent, we have received various questions regarding how IR departments would be affected by their growing presence. As a GuideLign member considered a possible replacement for a recent departure, they asked whether or not the existence of passive investors in their company's stock would affect the IR department’s staffing. Their initial assumption was that they could afford to cut back on their staff size because they wouldn’t have to speak to as many active investors. We proceeded to pose their question anonymously to GuideLign members to see their thoughts. As we reviewed the results of the survey, no one believed passive investing would have an effect on their staffing, but rather believed that MiFID II’s effect on the sell-side could present a need for extra personnel to compensate for the lack of research and access to their active investors.

Capital Deployment

A board was debating various capital deployment strategies and the GuideLign member called Rivel to understand specifically how growth investors are viewing various capital deployment initiatives, and how that has changed over the past five years. So, we went deep into our capital deployment study to carve out growth investors' preferences and delivered a one-pager highlighting the findings. The IRO was ecstatic as it helped frame the board discussion perfectly. He has used the GuideLign research library many times for insight that he shares with his board and management team.