You’ve spent years developing your product, fine-tuning your messaging, and scaling your business. Between multiple funding rounds, hiring team members, expanding sales and marketing, you’ve carved out a niche for your fintech business and are ready for the next level – the initial public offering.
Going public is a dream for many financial, technology and fintech companies. It can expose your business to millions of people who invest in your company and products, and enables the business to scale through bigger strategic partnerships, acquisitions, and more. There are multiple steps and layers to getting your company ready to file for an IPO, a topic we cover at length here and here. One of those steps – the IPO roadshow – kicks off the IPO period and is where the fun really begins.
KCD PR works with numerous publicly traded fintech and hi-tech companies, and most recently led Esports Technologies, a global provider of advanced electronic sports wagering products and technology, through a successful IPO in 2021.
Here are the top three tips to ensure your company’s IPO roadshow goes off without a hitch and get investors excited to hand over their wallets.
Give ‘Em That Razzle Dazzle
The IPO roadshow is an opportunity to impress, persuade, and build up excitement about the company and its IPO to institutional investors, analysts, fund managers, and hedge funds. No matter what industry you’re in, the presentation must bring the “razzle-dazzle” to convince this audience your company is a sure bet.
Investors, therefore, want to see what the market opportunity is, what your company has accomplished to date and what its plans are for the future. If you’re looking for world domination in a mobile banking category, the “razzle-dazzle” might come in the form of an impressive product portfolio and demo, along with a compelling company story, and nailing all the potential questions, objections, and concerns that investors might come up with.
Define and Refine Your Company Story
It’s one thing to know your company’s mission and vision, its humble beginnings, and impressive list of accomplishments. It’s another to clearly define and showcase all of that in bite-sized, digestible chunks that attract investors.
The IPO roadshow is the place in which your company story and vision shines – as long as it’s interesting, engaging, and easy to understand. Showcase the company story in a visually appealing way through video. Before diving into a presentation deck, tell viewers – in this case, your investors – who you are with a beautifully designed video that draws investors into your brand story.
The ability to verbalize the company story in a captivating way is just as important. While you may have a video do some of the talking, be sure to practice communicating that story aloud with test audiences, too.
Practice, practice, practice!
This year, IPO roadshows have taken to the virtual world, making it even more critical to fine-tune those presentation skills so it translates well through videoconferencing. The KCD PR approach is to start before the presentation deck is ready to determine what you’ll say, how you’ll say it, and get the messaging down right. As the IPO roadshow draws closer, you’ll want to hold several dress rehearsals – literally wearing the clothing you plan on the day of a meeting, using the right lighting, background, and technology. Treat the dress rehearsal like it’s the real deal!
The goal is to make your presentation as seamless and flawless as possible before the roadshow begins. With video conferencing from home being the norm, there are now more variables that can work against you – background noise, technology glitches, Wi-Fi outages, even fidgeting in your chair can distract audiences from your presentation. Without the benefit of gathering in a conference room, as most IPO roadshows meetings used to do before 2020, you’re already at a disadvantage. It’s easier to read a room when everyone is in it together versus spread across various video conferencing windows on a screen.
You may know your company like the back of your hand, but practicing your communication and presentation skills in a way that resonates with investors takes time. Every dress rehearsal requires your full energy, commitment, and attention. This training will be invaluable once you get in front of investors.
A Marathon or a Sprint?
Remember this: A video and roadshow deck are tools that add more color to your company story and makes the roadshow presentation more impressive. They are not, however; the end all be all. The months leading up to the IPO roadshow will feel like the hardest sprint of your life, but zoom out and you’ll see that you’re merely sprinting the last few miles of a full marathon. It’s tough and exhilarating all at once!
Invest in your presentation skills by hiring trained media professionals that will practice your presentation with you and give you live feedback, and leverage your investor relations team to help craft your message and get you ready for investors’ toughest questions. Include the entire C-suite in this process as they too are necessary.
