Generating liquidity in company stock can be tough. Just being a public company doesn’t provide a shareholder base or liquidity. Here are some signs that your investor base might be on the small side:
1) Not Enough Shareholders – Often I will be speaking with a CEO or an IR executive, and they will tell me that they have 300 shareholders. Unfortunately, as a public company that isn’t enough. With so few people knowing a Company story – you will never generate enough liquidity to attract professional investors. So, make sure you have a video that explains what you do in a professional manner that can be shared everywhere.
2) Not Enough People following the story – If you put out a press release on a national wire service, a good way to see how many followers you have is to see how many views the press release receives. Small cap companies struggle to get over 2000 views on a press release. While press is important – always try to bring readers back to your website and try and capture an email address.
3) Thinking that just putting out press is enough – CEOs will complain that they put out a great press release and that the market didn’t do anything. Yes, things can happen quickly based on good news being released – but this isn’t a sprint, it’s a marathon. Press releases have to be combined with a number of other communication efforts to make a permanent impact.
4) Attracting Hot Money – Even if you make an effort in investor relations and Social Media – Sometimes you attract investors that are looking for a trade rather than an investment. We think that management should focus on weaving a compelling long-term investment thesis for fundamental investors so that there is less focus on quarterly performance.
5) One-Dimensional Media – If a company always does the same thing to attract new investors it will be marketing to the same old investors over and over. We encourage the use of video, television, feature press, investor conferences and social media as parts of a cohesive plan.
We suggest that Companies execute shareholder creation strategies that get the shareholder number over 1000 shareholders and preferably many thousands of shareholders.
To achieve this goal takes a concerted and long-term effort to create awareness and develop a following for your story.
Fortunately – these efforts don’t have to be extremely expensive, and they tend to create shareholders that hold on to a stock. So there isn’t the volatility created by finding some of the hot money investors – who inevitably sell your stock and impact the price when they get attracted to another play
Author: Marcus Laun, CEO of Growth Circle, creates short, informative videos for Entrepreneurs and Small Cap Companies that highlight their companies & then we distribute them to our large network. We also have a fully transparent trading and distribution platform and community through Nvestly.com, providing 1000’s of actively engaged traders, users, and investors free tools to increase trading volume and liquidity in the market. Contact: Marcus@growthcircle.com