The Role of an IRO in Competitive Intelligence

TORONTO, Dec 7, 2016 /CNW/ - With the rapid rate of change in the Canadian business landscape, smart companies are keeping a close watch on both their competition and on public sentiment about their industry.

While some form of competitive intelligence has been carried out informally by investor relations officers (IROs) all along, today it is marked as a core of function of an IRO's role. 95% of IROs surveyed by Canadian Investor Relations Institute (CIRI) regularly gather information on their company's competitors. 

CNW spoke with Canadian investor relations experts about their methods, and summarized the conversations in a new white paper, now available for download. 

Intelligence gathering requires a thoughtful and deliberate approach and IROs are placing a focus on efficiency, effectiveness and strategic importance.

The best strategy seems to be one of cross-departmental collaboration, where IR partners with Communications, Marketing and Customer Service to share knowledge gleaned from engagement channels and monitoring sources. "Competitive intelligence can't be siloed in an organization," explains Greg Secord, vice president of investor relations for OpenText Corp. "Each department is stronger in one area of expertise." This approach ensures the IRO is on tp of issues and aware of trends that are outside of the portfolio yet impactful to valuation.

Social media monitoring is emerging as an invaluable source of market intelligence. Information about customer opinion, trending news or a groundswell of public interest in the industry at large can have enormous benefit. Deploying the correct tools to track company, competitor and industry mentions helps companies paint a more complete picture of the competitive environment in real-time.

Investor relations professionals interested in effective competitive intelligence tactics are invited to download our white paper here.

About CNW Group
CNW Group Ltd. (a Cision company) gets people talking about our clients online and in the news. We deliver authenticated news releases and multimedia content in the right way and to the right places in order to fulfill disclosure requirements and maximize exposure, engagement and earned media opportunities. CNW also provides professional video, photography and webcast production, translation, regulatory filing and printing services as well as monitoring and measurement platforms.

About Cision:
Cision is a leading media communication technology and analytics company that enables marketers and communicators to effectively manage their earned media programs in coordination with paid and owned channels to drive business impact. As the creator of the Cision Communication Cloud™, the first-of-its-kind earned media cloud-based platform, Cision has combined cutting-edge data, analytics, technology and services into a unified communication ecosystem that brands can use to build consistent, meaningful and enduring relationships with influencers and buyers in order to amplify their marketplace influence. Cision solutions also include market-leading media technologies such as PR Newswire, CNW, Gorkana, PRWeb, Help a Reporter Out (HARO) and iContact. Headquartered in Chicago, Cision serves over 100,000 customers in 170 countries and 40 languages worldwide, and maintains offices in North America, Europe, the Middle East, Asia, Latin America and Australia. For more information, visit www.cision.com or follow @Cision on Twitter.

SOURCE CNW Group Ltd.

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