Your small-cap stock is in fact a product.  A product with a brand and a promise of future performance, not unlike a new car.

The questions are; is your message credible – and is your message visible?

And what perceptions or word of mouth have you established?

Can I count on this company to do what it says it will do?

What are they showing me that earns both my attention and my trust?

As consumers, when we set out to buy a new vehicle, our research begins with our needs and objectives. From there we winnow our choices based on very personal standards for reliability, aesthetics, performance and of course our budget. Other subtle and more emotional elements also enter the decision framework; brand reputation, auto reviews, reliability and opinions from friends or colleagues.

Typically, a ‘short list’ of factors emerges – ranking our investment options by price point, features and performance characteristics.

If the automaker has done it’s job, they’ve created awareness and enough enthusiasm & credibility to justify a visit to the showroom. And finally, if the product meets our test drive due diligence, we’ll pull the trigger on the investment.

Stocks are selected in the very same way. For small-caps, an unclear story, brand or value proposition will make the difference between a new investment and “no thanks.” It’s also hard to invest in a stock you’ve never heard of!

But this is the exact position in which many small-caps find themselves. They are off the radar – without proactive targeting and outreach – and even when discovered, their messages are neither clear nor credible or too reliant on SEC filings that provide a very limited view of the full investment scope. Further, there’s no strategy for follow through or proactive engagement to gain mind share and stay there.

Appropriate IR outreach and messaging is a full time job, but unlike the automaker analogy – public companies can’t spend hundreds of millions on sophisticated promotion.

That’s where Catalyst IR comes in – we bring the experience, the methods and the ongoing follow up that creates exposure and fosters understanding and credibility. We let our clients focus more on building their business – while help them build their Wall Street audience.