The IABC Handbook of Organizational Communication: A Guide to Internal Communication, Public Relations, Marketing, and Leadership

The Story

The quantitative information is an important part of the process of determining whether to invest in a company. But there is another important qualitative factor that goes into the evaluation mix. In investor relations vernacular, this is called the story. Investors will make a subjective judgment about a company on the basis of its story.

According to Mavrinac (1997), 35 percent of the investment decision is based on nonfinancial factors. Important performance characteristics include the quality of products and services, strength of the company's market position, the effectiveness of compensation policies, the quality of investor communications, level of customer satisfaction, and strength of corporate culture.

A common theme that ...