Story on Electronic Shareholder Forums in February Issue of IR Update

Abe Wischnia's article on electronic shareholder forums is in the February 2009 issue of IR Update (page 12). It's a nice summary of why Oxygen Biotherapeutics implemented eShareholderForum, what the challenges were, what the benefits are, and what the early results have been. The issue can be found on the NIRI website at http://www.niri.org/mem_service_area/irupdate/index.cfm

PrecisionIR, iMiners, and Abe Wischnia Associates Team Up for Webinar on Electronic Shareholder Forums

This is now live on the PrecisionIR website under "Webinar Series":
http://www.precisionir.com/about/events.aspx. See the link to the webinar for Electronic Shareholder Forum. It is a 35 minute educational webinar about e-forums and the iMiners solution. We are proud to be working with Abe and the PrecisionIR team to offer eShareholderForum to any public company that wishes to use Web 2.0 technology to communicate more efficiently with its shareholders!

Activity on OXBO's eShareholderForum

OXBO's eShareholderForum has been live on their website for about 2 weeks now, and it was only announced 10 days ago (via press release). But already the e-forum is getting quite a bit of activity. There are already 27 verified shareholders who have registered (and been approved by OXBO) to participate (post) in the e-forum, and another 17 pending approval (anyone can read posts in the e-forum, but in order to post OXBO is requiring that you verify you are a current shareholder). The message boards are getting a ton of page views, and quite a few comments/input from the 27 shareholders approved to post. Also, check out the Q&A section: it looks like it's been a very successful start. Shareholders have been submitting questions to OXBO management, and OXBO management is posting answers. Also, CEO Chris Stern posted to his blog on 11/20, to communicate his vision of the e-forum to shareholders. And he will continue to blog. The only feature that hasn't been utilized (yet) is the polling.

So in summary already OXBO is an excellent example of how a company can utilize an electronic shareholder forum to drive traffic from third party message boards to their IR site, enable shareholders to engage in a dialogue with each other on the IR site, and enable management and IR to engage in a dialogue directly with shareholders.

PRESS RELEASE: Oxygen Biotherapeutics, Inc. Creates Web-based Shareholder Forum For Interactive Communications With Investors

Here is the press releases issued by Oxygen Biotherapeutics today announcing the launch of their e-forum (see 11/24/2008 release):
http://www.oxybiomed.com/pages/newsroom.html

Oxygen Biotherapeutics Goes Live with eShareholderForum

Today marked another milestone for iMiners: the launch of our very first (and the industry's first) electronic shareholder forum. Oxygen Biotherapeutics is traded on the OTC (ticker OXBO) and signed up for the service in July. They utilize Thomson Reuters to host their IR site, so their Shareholder Forum is seamlessly integrated. This is a soft launch; they'll be issuing a press release shortly to announce it to the public, but it is now live. We feel very strongly that these e-forums will soon become commonplace on many, many company IR sites. Now that OXBO has blazed the trail, others will be less shy about following.

Check it out for yourself: http://www.oxybiomed.com/pages/InvestorRelations.html (go to "Shareholder Forum"; anyone can read content, but to post in the message boards, ask a question, or participate in a poll you need to register and be approved as a verified shareholder).

CEO Blogging

Blogging is becoming more and more mainstream among C-level executives. It is slowly being adopted in Investor Relations (see the Dell IR blog called DellShares: http://dellshares.dell.com). But many forward thinking CEOs of both public and private companies blog extensively, and have been doing so for quite some time. For example, see how Jonathan Schwartz, CEO of Sun Microsystems, blogs to shareholders at http://blogs.sun.com/jonathan. See also how Penny Herscher, CEO of privately-held firstRain (San Mateo, CA), blogs at http://pennyherscher.blogspot.com. At iMiners we've been blogging since the beginning of the year to provide updates on our progress, insight into market developments, and to provide additional information to our clients, partners, and investors. Based on conversations we are having with IROs at leading public companies we expect the trend of IR blogs to continue to accelerate into 2009 as companies realize the communications advantages that blogging brings......

iMiners and PrecisionIR Extend Reseller Agreement to eShareholderForum

We're pleased to announce that we have extended our Reseller Agreement with PrecisionIR to include eShareholderForum (http://www.eshareholderforum.com), the industry's first turnkey solution to help any company establish a company-sponsored electronic shareholder forum on their IR website. Effective immediately, PrecisionIR will be offering eShareholderForum to its current and future clients. By providing eShareholderForum with its standard IR website solution, PrecisionIR will be the first service provider to offer a "Web 2.0" IR website package. We'll be introducing eShareholderForum to PrecisionIR clients via a webinar with PrecisionIR in early-to-mid November. Stay tuned for more details! The world of IR websites is changing, and for the better. Companies truly interested in leveraging their IR websites to communicate and engage in a dialogue with shareholders and prospective shareholders can do it now.

Communicating With Shareholders During These Challenging Times

Stocks dropped today for the 8th straight trading day, and the Dow is down 25% over that period. The up and down swings in the market are enough to make any investor queasy, and no one knows where the bottom is. Now, more than ever, IROs need to be communicating with shareholders to let them know what is going on. The institutions have an IRO's ear already, so how does an IRO communicate effectively and efficiently to a large retail shareholder base?

There is no better time for companies with large and/or active retail shareholder bases to consider implementing Web 2.0 technology to engage in a dialogue. Electronic shareholder forums, in particular, are taylor made to help a company quickly communicate to large groups of shareholders. "Democratization" of shareholder information is available today through this technology. eShareholderForum (http://www.eshareholderforum.com) is a turnkey Shareholder Communications Platform that companies should strongly consider utilizing. Message boards, blogs, polling and Q&A all give retail shareholders an opportunity to find out from the company what is going on. No wonder there is so much interest!

iMiners to Present at NIRI SF Luncheon

On October 14 I'll be on a panel at the San Francisco NIRI luncheon, with the topic being "Electronic Shareholder Forums and Blogs". Joining me will be Abe Wischnia, IR Consultant for our first eShareholderForum client, Oxygen Biotherapeutics. This is a great opportunity for us to discuss the topic of e-forums to a wide audience of IROs in the Bay Area! For more details see: http://acteva.com/booking.cfm?bevaID=168239

What Do the Lawyers Think of Electronic Shareholder Forums?

I enjoyed reading a recent article written by Brendan J. Radigan, a Partner at the law firm Edwards Angell Palmer & Dodge. It's titled "Is Social Networking With Shareholders Safe", and addresses head-on concerns that companies might have regarding setting up electronic shareholder forums. We've seen the SEC encouraging companies to implement e-forums, so now it is refreshing to see a legal opinion also promoting the benefits for companies and shareholders (while at the same time, advising companies of where they need to be cautious).

I especially like Brendan's conclusion: "If thoughtfully structured and operated, a public company's electronic shareholder forum could provide an exciting addition to its investor relations program. Promotion of social networking by, with and among shareholders could well provide a public company, particularly one operating in a fast-moving technology field, with an innovative and cutting-edge way of distinguishing itself from its peers and competitors."

iMiners Continues Strong Momentum!

eShareholderForum continues to generate a tremendous amount of interest: Next month Abe Wischnia (IR Consultant for our first client, Oxygen Biotherapeutics) and I will be organizing a panel discussion for the San Francisco NIRI luncheon (topic will be "Electronic Shareholder Forums and Blogs"). We'll also have a feature story in an upcoming issue of IR Update. And this week I was interviewed by Compliance Week for an upcoming column on e-forums. Finally, PR pundit, best-selling author, and speaker David Meerman Scott blogged about us last week:
http://www.webinknow.com/2008/09/social-media-fi.html

It's been only about 90 days since the NIRI Annual conference in San Diego. It's very exciting to reflect back on the tremendous amount of progress we've made in such a short period of time: Starting to build a sales team, signing reseller agreements, getting lots of PR, enhancing our products, and finally, growing our client base! We are all looking forward to what we can accomplish in the next 90 days, and the 90 days after that!

Here Come the E-Forums!

It was nice to see we got a couple of mentions from some well followed IR bloggers regarding eShareholderForum in the past couple of days. Broc Romanek of TheCorporateCounsel.net and InvestorRelationships.com mentioned us in his 9/4 post called "Here Come the E-Forums" here: http://www.thecorporatecounsel.net/blog/archive/001888.html

Also, Anil Dilawri of Hill & Knowlton in Canada has an IR blog called "Taking Investor Relations to the Next Level", and his 9/3 post called "Not Your Father's IR Department" was about iMiners and eShareholderForum: http://blogs.hillandknowlton.com/blogs/anildilawri/archive/2008/09/03/not-your-father-s-ir-department.aspx

Lastly, and most significantly, we have been asked to participate in InvestorRelationships.com's January webcast event titled "The SEC's New Corporate Website Guidance: Everything You Need to Know – And Do NOW". I'll be contributing to a panel discussion with other experts and pioneers in the area of e-forums and blogging, including the Dell IR team, an IRO from Cisco, and representatives from ISS and Broadridge. The session is called "The Future is Here: E-Forums and Blogs". Go here http://www.investorrelationships.com/webcast/2009/01_14.htm and scroll to the bottom of the page to see the panel participants.

In summary, you'll be continuing to hear about iMiners and eShareholderForum in coming weeks and months. As Anil says in his 9/3 blog post "Leaders in the IR space are already blazing trails when it comes to evolving their investor communications practices to include meaningful and innovative digital communications. The followers are bound to follow."

Electronic Shareholder Forums gaining momentum

Electronic shareholder forums, also known as e-shareholder forums (like what iMiners announced in June with our turnkey solution eShareholderForum: http://www.eshareholderforum.com/) continue to gain momentum and visibility as a truly viable way for companies to engage in dialogue with shareholders using "Web 2.0" technology. Our own solution has already been positively received in the market, and yesterday on its earnings conference call Broadridge CEO Rich Daly announced plans to launch an "investor network" linking all "validated shareholders" with companies they are invested in (for more information visit the IR Web Report blog here http://www.irwebreport.com/daily/2008/08/15/huge-social-network-for-us-shareholders-planned).

The SEC's encouragement of companies using new technologies to facilitate communications is finally starting to take off, and we think that in the not too distant future shareholder forums will become standard on many company IR websites (at least for those companies not afraid to embrace new technologies, and not afraid to have a dialogue with shareholders).

Since the late 1990s most companies have maintained content on IR websites where they deposit information for investors (and prospective investors) to read/view. What has been lacking in IR websites is a two way dialogue between the company and shareholders. But electronic shareholder forums are already beginning to change the way IR websites are viewed. No longer just a depository for information, IR websites will be a place for any shareholder, prospective shareholder, employee, supplier, etc. to come and engage in a dialogue with a company, virtually real-time, and the flow of information will be streamlined and "democratized" (in the words of Rob Williams, Sr. Director of IR at Dell, in his description of Dell's IR blog called Dell Shares).

Companies have been searching for ways to lure investors from financial portal sites to their IR sites so they can tell their own story in their own words (several studies show declining use of company IR websites over the past few years). Company sponsored electronic shareholder forums represent a new and unique "hook" for companies to drive traffic to their IR site, by promising to engage in a dialogue with investors. Who would go to Yahoo! Finance to view company financial information and a third-party message board (where anyone can post anything they want, and the company does not participate) if a company provides unique content on their own IR site PLUS a link to their electronic shareholder forum where the company engages in the message boards, posts to a blog, conducts online Q&A with shareholders, and conducts real-time polling of relevant issues to get a quick pulse of what is on shareholders' minds?

We welcome these continued developments, and look forward to introducing eShareholderForum to as many companies as are willing to engage in this type of online dialogue with shareholders!

iMiners signs first eShareholderForum client

This week we received a signed contract for our first eShareholderForum client. This company will also be using us on their website for "Press Releases By Type" to enhance the content they currently have hosted by Thomson Reuters. We are very excited about this as we just announced eShareholderForum as a product 6 weeks ago. Oxygen Biotherapeutics is traded on the OTC:BB exchange with the ticker OXBO. They have an IR consultant (Abe Wischnia) and a CEO (Chris Stern) who are both forward-thinking and enthusiastic about proactively communicating with shareholders. We look forward to working with Abe and Chris going forward, and look forward to the continued accelerating interest in eShareholderForum from other companies who are not afraid of using "Web 2.0" technology to engage in a dialogue with shareholders.

iMiners Gets Rave Reviews at the 2008 NIRI Annual Conference

The National Investor Relations Institute Annual Conference was held this week at the Manchester Grand Hyatt in San Diego from June 8-11. This was our first opportunity to exhibit to a national (actually international) audience of over 1,500 people. All our products were received very favorably, and we made significant progress towards finalizing joint marketing/reseller agreements, as well as signing new clients directly.

In just the last month iMiners has launched two new products: PR Cycle (http://www.prcycle.com/) and eShareholderForum (http://www.eshareholderforum.com/). We are quickly being recognized as the new innovator in IR and PR. eShareholderForum is the industry's first turnkey solution to help companies set up a company-sponsored electronic forum to facilitate direct communications between and among shareholders and management. And PR Cycle has been universally endorsed as an innovative new product to assist people with researching and drafting press releases. Our flagship products, Press Releases By Type and our eChart solution were also received very favorably by all.

Comments from people who stopped by our booth included "Simple, yet brilliant", "This is by far the best new product we've seen at NIRI 2008", and "This is the best new technology we've seen". In summary, our database of categorized news releases is unique and compelling, and the products we have developed around our growing database are relevant. We look forward to continuing our progress in 2008 in signing new clients and partnerships, and developing our unique product line! Stay tuned!

iMiners, Inc. Announces Availability of eShareholderForum; Industry's First Turnkey Electronic Shareholder Forum Solution

iMiners demonstrates again its leadership position in being an innovator and pioneer in PR and IR communications solutions. Today we announced the industry's first turnkey Electronic Shareholder Forum solution for public companies to facilitate communications among shareholders, and between the company and its shareholders. eShareholderForum (http://www.eshareholderforum.com/) will soon be going into beta testing; interested parties can contact us at our website. See the press release:

LIVERMORE, Calif., June 5, 2008 -- iMiners, Inc., an innovator in IR and PR communications solutions, today announced the availability of eShareholderForum, the first full-service, turnkey Electronic Shareholder Forum solution to enable public companies to facilitate communications among shareholders, and between the company and its shareholders. eShareholderForum will allow any public company to quickly and cost-effectively establish a company sponsored forum directly from the company's investor relations website. eShareholderForum will help companies take advantage of the recent rulings by the SEC encouraging the use of electronic shareholder forums to facilitate better dialogue among shareholders, and between shareholders and the company. In the final ruling, effective February 25, 2008, the SEC effectively removed the two major obstacles that had been holding companies back. First, amended Rule 14a-2 states that participation in an electronic forum will not constitute a "solicitation subject to the proxy rules" if certain conditions are satisfied. Second, a new Rule 14a-17 ensures that a company or vendor that operates an electronic forum "will not be liable under the federal securities laws for any statement or information provided by another person participating in the forum."

"The SEC and its Chairman Christopher Cox are keen and proactively encouraging Electronic Shareholder Forums for all public companies. While there are many options available, iMiners' eShareholderForum is the only one that optimally addresses the key concerns relating to controllability and ongoing costs of maintenance," said Jnyaneshwar Prabhu, founder and president.

iMiners will be demonstrating its eShareholderForum service at the National Investor Relations Institute Annual Conference Booth 713 from June 8-11 at the Manchester Grand Hyatt in San Diego. Companies interested in learning more, including taking part in beta testing should visit http://www.eshareholderforum.com/.

Electronic Shareholder Forums: Web 2.0 Technology Is Encouraged by the SEC

In this world of blogging, My Space, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc. it seems Web 2.0 technology is creeping into all facets of our lives. But in the Investor Relations world companies are communicating to constituents "same as it ever was". Dell's IR team has implemented the only noteable IR blog, but it has little participation (http://dellshares.dell.com/) so far from shareholders. Other companies have been slow to embrace new technologies to communicate with shareholders. That may be about to change.

In November the SEC voted to adopt amendments to the federal proxy rules to facilitate the use of electronic shareholder forums: http://www.sec.gov/news/press/2007/2007-247.htm. And in January they released the 35 page final rule release for shareholder forums. Noteable in the final ruling is that 1) Amended Rule 14a-2 provides that participation in an electronic forum will not constitute a "solicitation subject to the proxy rules" and 2) Amended Rule 14a-17 provides that a shareholder or company (including 3rd party provider) that operates an electronic forum "will not be liable under the federal securities laws for any statement or information provided by another person participating in the forum". The effective date was February 25, 2008.

What does this all mean? It means that the Securities and Exchange Commission is encouraging (but not mandating) companies to embrace Web 2.0 technology (specifically Electronic Shareholder Forums) as a means of better communicating with shareholders, analysts, and other constituents.

What is an Electronic Shareholder Forum? First, it is NOT a message board or chat room. An effective Electronic Shareholder Forum should be a site where investors can come to interact with other shareholders, company management, and directors to ask questions and engage in dialogue. Company management can get a pulse on what investors are thinking, and by doing it in a company sponsored forum it will have much more credibility than any chat room or message board (especially if the Electronic Shareholder Forum is the only place where management and directors respond to shareholder inquiries). But much like a conference call, not everyone can necessarily ask questions, and not every question/comment will get addressed. This is necessary to ensure the forum does not deteriorate into a message board where anything goes.

"Today's action is intended to tap the potential of technology to help shareholders communicate with one another and express their concerns to companies in ways that could be more effective and less expensive," said SEC Chairman Christopher Cox. "The rule amendments are intended to remove legal concerns, such as the risk that discussion in an online forum might be viewed as a proxy solicitation, that might deter shareholders and companies from using this new technology."

At this point in time the SEC has not mandated how these forums should be used, so as to encourage experimentation by issuers and vendors. It'll be interesting to see who the early adopters are, and how quickly other companies jump on the Electronic Shareholder Forum bandwagon.