IPO: The Real Value of Facebook

With a large stage set up outdoors this morning in Menlo Park’s “Hacker Square,” in place of visiting the New York exchange, Mark Zuckerberg, CEO and founder of Facebook along with hundreds of employees and supporters gathered to ring the Nasdaq’s opening bell ahead of the network’s long-awaited IPO.

To back up a bit, (and dust off our knowledge of stock market lingo 101) an IPO, initial public offering, is basically a stock market launch. It is the first sale of stock by a company to the public and can be used by companies small or large to raise expansion capital and become publicly traded enterprises.

But why would this recent IPO news be important, or even relevant to PR practitioners? We will still post content the same way now as we did before when Facebook was private. But as communicators, marketers and PR pros creating a voice for our clients, it is our responsibility to be aware of the changes of our mediums, however large or small the changes may be.

We already know Facebook certainly has a lot going for it with 845 million users, high engagement, growing revenue and strong developments such as the recent acquisition of the popular photo sharing application, Instagram. But the recent IPO changes in the future may not be so obvious.

Ragan’s PR Daily lists a few factors on how the recent IPO changes can affect the role it plays on PR for clients. You can view the article here. The writer, Kevin Allen, discuss questions such as, with more pressure on the company, will users have to pay for posts in the future? What will pages look like in the future? Will the role of advertising on Facebook become even more prevalent?

According to MoneyWatch, Facebook is priced at $38 per share but expected to zoom higher in the early stages. This offering price also means the company is valued at $104 billion. Even the opening sticker price makes Facebook the biggest-ever valuation by an American company at the time of its offering and the second-largest U.S. IPO ever behind Visa. For a fun look at how Facebook has changed all we do online in the past eight years, check out this Fast Company article.

How do you think the recent IPO will change how Facebook operates? What will it mean for PR pros and how we brand our clients?

This post was contributed by Lauren Venegas.

IPO: The Real Value of Facebook

Grass Roots PR - RoundUp for StartUps


When our client, Chris Gay, came to us with his latest idea, we were eager to learn more. He is the mastermind behind Texas’ first pay-by-the-mile auto insurance company, and is about to launch his second start-up, Zengine. We knew whatever he had up his sleeve would be innovative, and we were right!

His idea was born when he started recruiting to staff his new venture, and came to the disappointing realization that there was a severe drought in Dallas’ tech talent pool. So, he had the idea to bring the start-up community together for a social recruiting event unlike any of its kind in the region. He wanted to call it, “RoundUp for StartUps,” and he wanted our help promoting it. We knew this would be a fun, but challenging project.

We set out by drafting a 3 month-long PR plan, mapping out our activities week-by-week. First we researched. And then we researched some more. We started with a list of local and tech media, and then set out to find appropriate contacts at every major College or University in the region. We also got on MeetUp.com to find tech and engineering related groups in DFW that might be interested in attending the RoundUp event. We started a Twitter feed @roundupstartups to help us spread the word in this social sphere and send direct messages to colleges, groups and media across the region. We left no stone unturned.

Our outreach was traditional and very grassroots. It consisted of direct media pitching, direct and social media correspondence with Colleges and Universities as well as local/regional start-up, tech and entrepreneur-driven organizations, a BusinessWire distribution and consistent communication with all the companies participating in the event. Our biggest hit came from the Dallas Morning News, where reporter Sheryl Jean not only touted the event, but explained the logic behind it. Tons of IT positions exist in Dallas, yet talent is frequently lost to the East and West coasts. This media hit had Chris’ phone ringing off the hook the morning it ran. It even landed him on a speaking panel three days later at UTD to discuss building a startup team – another opportunity to spread the word about RoundUp for StartUps to a captive audience. He has received numerous invitations since then to serve as a guest speaker at other like-minded entrepreneurial organizations.

We would say our grassroots media campaign utilizing traditional and non-traditional media tactics has been a success and it’s not even event day! Today, two days before the big event, we have received nearly 500 RSVPs. More than 30 companies are participating and combined they are looking to fill nearly 130 jobs. Do you know a recent graduate or tech professional looking to join an innovative startup company in Dallas? Let them know they should join us at this free event. There will be two hours of networking, followed by two hours of entertainment and socializing. Oh, and did we mention it was at a brewery? All they have to do is RSVP!

This post was contributed by Shelby Menczer