Best
practices for archived webcasts
There's a world of difference between the format
and usability requirements of live versus archived
webcasts. Investors have less incentive to use
old webcasts, so easing common usability barriers
is vital.
Communicating
compensation information online
It's the most controversial governance
issue— and the least likely to be
discussed openly by companies. See what leading
companies are doing to be more upfront about executive
pay.
Angry
shareholders outflank companies on the web
It's a virtual war for the hearts and minds of
shareholders, and the companies are losing. Two
recent proxy battles highlight how the Web can
give dissident shareholders a greater voice and
carry their message to millions.
Best practices
for online annual meetings
Annual meetings are an opportunity for companies
to walk the walk of good governance. Companies
that take them seriously on the Web can strengthen
their websites' credibility.
The last word
about online annual reports
We've written thousands of words about online
annual reports. But this is it, our final word
on the topic. And it's all that you will ever
need to know.
Benchmarking reveals best and worst in online IR
As stakeholders turn to the Web for information,
IR Web Report's rolling study of 500 global large-caps
highlights why many sites fail.
Study finds
online Annual Reports in bad shape
Less than 40% of global large-cap companies are
providing their annual reports in usable Web formats,
according to IR Web Report's third annual study.
10
Must-Do's for a better IR website
Our annual Things-To-Do list offers something
for every company.
Integrating
corporate responsibility information into your
IR website
Prompted by growing investor interest in corporate
responsibility factors, companies are weaving
social and environmental performance into their
online IR communications.
Using the
Web to communicate in a crisis
When your company's reputation is under fire,
influential stakeholders will turn to your website
for information. What they find when they get
there can make all the difference.
Are you getting
value from your vendor?
Many companies are paying for services that have
little or no value. In other cases, they're paying
good money for products that undermine the credibility
of their websites.
10 Common
Mistakes on IR websites -- revisited
How much has changed on IR websites in the
two years since we first listed the most common
follies? What new things should site managers
beware of?
What is the
best online annual report approach?
We review the six main approaches for publishing
annual report content online and come up with
recommendations that every company should follow.
10
common mistakes on IR websites
They've come a long way, but most IR websites
are still locked in paper-based world that won't
let them be all that they can. We document the
key obstacles to effective online Investor Relations.
How to design
a better investor relations homepage
Does your site engage new visitors from the first
screen? Can repeat visitors quickly find what
they want? Here's a simple way to make sure your
homepage works for everyone.
How to create a winning
corporate governance section
Our surveys find that most companies are ill-prepared
for heightened investor scrutiny of corporate
governance issues. Here are some best practices
for governance disclosure on the Internet.
Best practices
for directors' pages
Despite all of the attention on corporate directors,
most companies provide insufficient detail in
director biographies or make common formatting
mistakes.
Best practices
for insider transaction information on your website
There's a lot more companies can do to make their
insider ownership information more meaningful.
Preparing
earnings releases for the Web
Earnings releases haven't changed much over the
years. Which is a problem because the way people
read them certainly has. Here's how to make your
news release work for a wired world.
Best
practices for online speeches and presentations
Presentations and speeches can provide investors
with valuable insights and build investor understanding
of your strategy and opportunities. So how do
you make sure your message is being heard?
The case for conference
call transcripts
Your decision to provide transcripts comes down
to your commitment to keeping investors informed.
10 reasons
to avoid image-based reports
There are better ways to save money or improve
your report's communications impact than falling
for these no-win products.
Don't convert
financial information to images
In a bid to save a few extra minutes, web designers
are taking a short-cut that could end up costing
you a lot more in the long run.
Make your financial
statements useful
If financial statements are at the heart of all
investment analysis, why aren't they easy to find
on your IR website?
Optimizing
MD&As for the Web
Small improvements to how you post your MD&A
online can have huge impacts on investor confidence
and understanding.
Best practices for online
annual meetings
Annual meetings are an opportunity for companies
to walk the walk of good governance. Companies
that take them seriously on the Web can strengthen
their websites' credibility.
Investor relations contacts pages
Cut the amount of email you get by providing better
contact information and intelligently structuring
your contacts page.
Managing email inquiries
from investors
Surprising results from an email responsiveness
test of 100 blue-chip companies illustrates the
lack of standards for handling online correspondence.
Five approaches
for investment propositions
Some call it the proposition, the argument or
simply "the story." Whatever you call
it, it's crucial that your IR website has one.
Email IR newsletters
gain currency
Companies are using one of the online marketer's
best tools to provide analysts and investors with
the context they need to understand their businesses
more intimately.
Best practices
for email alerts
Email is a powerful tool, more so perhaps than
even the Web itself. But alerts are fraught with
potential pitfalls that can undermine your credibility.
Better
stock chart benchmarks
Choosing the right benchmarks for your stock graphs
can help build credibility with investors.
Communicating
the merger: how two deals were handled on the
Web
Two mergers are
announced on the same day. The market reacts very
differently to each. Did it help that one of the
deals was aggressively communicated on the web?
Managing inbound
links to boost your site's profile and protect
your credibility
How would you feel if someone clicked a link to
your corporate website and got a pornographic site instead? What if people were still linking
to a page you thought had been removed
from your site two years ago?
Avoiding broken
links on your website
An embarrassing blackout of links to Canada's
national securities repository highlights the
need for IR website owners to be more thorough
in managing their sites.
The analysts' library
Here's a wonderful example of using technology
to make your job easier while at the same time
making your IR website a more useful destination
for analysts.
Should you
switch to XML?
XML promises dramatic improvements to how investor
relations websites work. Leading companies are
taking advantage, but does
it make sense for you?
Five usability
taboos for investor relations websites
Almost three quarters of portfolio managers cite
poor ease of use as their biggest problem with
IR websites. Here are five common problems you
need to avoid.
Why user experience
matters
Just like bad customer service or a messy storefront,
poor user experience on your website can influence
people's perceptions of your company. It's time
you became an advocate of user experience in your
company.
Stop
misusing PDFs (please!)
Misuse of the PDF format is rampant on
IR websites. Transgressions range from blind
linking to plain overindulgence. Here's the
proper protocol for using PDFs.
Writing
for IR websites
Gray
text is positively off-putting online. Here are
simple and effective ways to give your pages greater
impact.
Good links
make good IR websites
Links make the web work. Yet too often these integral
components of online experience are tampered with
to the point of break down. We chronicle some
of the most common mistakes site owners make when
formatting their links.
What's
so important about page titles?
A survey of 100 of biggest US companies'
IR homepages shows that 40 percent of them have
faulty page titles. So what are page titles anyway,
and why should you care?
Avoiding "link
rot" on your website
An embarrassing blackout of links to Canada's
national securities repository highlights the
need for IR website owners to be more thorough
in managing their sites.
The loot
bag concept
A timesaving tool for investors gains currency
on IR websites, and some interesting twists on
user-centred information design.
Build a site
that works for your investors
Want your investor relations website to be more
engaging and dynamic? Try these proven techniques
for structuring your site.
10
Must-Do's for a better IR website
Our annual Things-To-Do list offers something
for every company.
NIRI 2003 Annual
Conference presentation
The text, slides and links to examples
are available for the presentation I gave on Best
Practices for IR Websites. It includes many good tips on how to improve
your site for our IR Web Report Global Benchmarks™.
Lots wrong
with IR websites, study finds
Web usability firm Nielsen Norman Group provides
some interesting insights into how potential investors use IR websites to assess companies
for investment.
Five ways to
boost your company's credibility online
A company's relationship with the market is all
about trust. Learn about the factors most likely
to affect how investors assess the credibility
of your website, your most important communications
vehicle.
Show shareholders
you care with these website improvements
A confluence of factors has made effective shareholder
communication more important than ever. Here are
six ways you can start earning the benefit of
the doubt from shareholders for when you need
it.
Five resolutions to improve
your IR website
Implementing just one of our resolutions is virtually
guaranteed to lead to a vastly improved IR website.
Take all five of them to heart and you could very
well put me out of business.
Insider
Web posting milestone not without its missteps
The deadline has come and gone, but there are
five important lessons we can all learn from the
first mandatory requirement for companies to use
their websites to make information available to
investors.
Trends in
online governance disclosure
Most public companies still fail to provide basic
corporate governance information on their corporate
websites. And it's not a pretty picture depending
on how big your are and where you live.
GE, others
move to make their websites credible
Large-cap companies revise their IR websites to
emphasize their trustworthiness and transparency.
Success is a case of walking the talk through
online actions instead of just words.
Trends in online
annual reports 2003
Our research of online annual report best practices
shows that companies are beefing up their reports
and making them easier to use at the same time.
NIRI Annual
Conference 2002 special report
If there was one single theme of this year's product
introductions, it was that XML, the new language
of the Internet, has finally arrived.
The case
for conference call transcripts
Your decision to provide transcripts comes down
to your commitment to keeping investors informed.
Better
stock chart benchmarks
Choosing the right benchmarks for your stock graphs
can help build credibility with investors.
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