Unlocking Valuation: How Public Company CEOs Must Challenge Conventional Investor Communications
The Undervaluation Frustration (Creating Constructive Tension)
You’ve hit every target. Revenue is growing, execution is solid, and your team is firing on all cylinders. Internally, it feels like you’re winning. But externally, your stock price doesn’t reflect the momentum. The board is asking questions. Your team is growing restless. You’re doing the work, but the market just isn’t catching on.
You’re not alone. We hear this all the time from CEOs who are genuinely delivering—on revenue, product, execution—yet find themselves fielding tough questions from investors and internal stakeholders alike. “Why isn’t the market responding?” “What are we missing?” “Is it a macro issue—or is it us?”
The truth? It’s often neither. More often than not, it comes down to a misfire in communication. The message investors hear isn’t the one you think you’re sending. And in a market flooded with information, perception isn’t just part of the game—it is the game.
This is the reality for many CEOs of high-performing public companies. It’s not that investors aren’t paying attention. It’s that they’re not seeing a story they can model, believe in, or back. And that’s what this blog is here to fix—because if your investor communications aren’t building conviction, you’re leaving value on the table.
The Pitfalls of “Playing It Safe” (Challenging Current Assumptions)
Investor relations used to be simple: disclose, comply, don’t rock the boat. And in a world of steady growth and predictable markets, that might have been enough. But today, playing it safe is often the riskiest strategy of all.
We see it again and again: well-intentioned internal IR teams or external partners that operate like communications departments. They handle the press releases, prep for earnings calls, and distribute updates on schedule. But none of that guarantees the market truly understands your story. And if investors don’t see your future clearly—or worse, if they don’t believe in it—they’ll move on to a company they can value with more confidence.
Too many CEOs mistake activity for impact. Investor communications isn’t about keeping up appearances—it’s about shaping belief. Just because you’ve said something doesn’t mean the market heard it the way you intended.
Let’s be clear: investor communications isn’t about catchy and repeatable soundbites—it’s about conviction. Your job isn’t to tell the market what happened last quarter, no matter how well you dress it up. It’s to show them what happens next, and, most importantly, why it matters. Strategic IR doesn’t just inform; it educates, inspires, and creates clarity in a world full of noise.
Here are a few common safe but ineffective IR habits that may be dragging down your valuation:
- Releasing compliant but lifeless press releases
- Recycling language from last quarter’s earnings call
- Avoiding bold forward-looking statements for fear of being ‘too aggressive’
- Relying on templates instead of tailoring communications to what matters most now
- Defaulting to disclosure language instead of value-building narrative
These tactics might check boxes, but they rarely move the needle. Investors don’t want canned messaging. They want clarity, confidence, and a story that holds up under scrutiny.
If your current IR approach is built for caution instead of conviction, it may be time to rethink the model entirely. Because in modern markets, invisibility is the real risk.
Inside the Investor’s Brain — What Truly Drives Decisions
After 20 years as an institutional investor, I can tell you: investors don’t reward competence. They reward conviction.
Competence is expected. It’s table stakes. What truly drives decision-making on the buy side isn’t just what you’ve achieved. It’s whether your story signals momentum, clarity, and long-term potential. I’ve sat across from hundreds of CEOs, all walking me through solid historical numbers. But only a few left me thinking, “This is a company I can back.”
I’ll never forget one meeting in particular. The CEO walked in, confident, armed with all the right metrics, including year-over-year revenue up 15%, solid EBITDA growth, strong market penetration. On paper, the story was airtight. But when we started asking questions—what’s next? what should we expect in 12 months?—he had no clear answer. Just vague ambition and backward-looking success. He was a bit stumped to be honest—the proverbial deer in the headlights.
Then, a week later, another CEO from a similar company came in. Similar numbers. Similar size. But completely different energy. She didn’t just present results—she mapped out the trajectory. She showed us why her current KPIs were the early signals of an inflection point, and how new metrics would soon matter more than legacy ones. She spoke like someone who’d thought deeply about how an investor would model her company—not just how to impress them with historical wins.
Guess who we backed?
The difference was belief. She didn’t just show us her business. She gave us the tools for how to properly value it.
And here’s another thing: it was clear she wasn’t just a witty, on-the-ball, great orator or marketing genius. It wasn’t that she was able to think on her feet and come up with a great story to make me buy whatever she was selling (although she was, and did, all of those things). It was that she had done the work. She had these figures, and this story, ready to go. She knew her numbers back to front, and inside out. She knew what questions to expect from me, and she knew exactly how to answer them. In the “trust but verify” mantra that investors follow, she nailed the first part and I trusted her.
That’s the crux of strategic investor communications. It’s not just simple reporting. It’s capital formation. You’re not just talking about your performance—you’re creating the conditions for trust, conviction, and buy-in. And when you get it right, it fundamentally changes how the market sees you.
Too many CEOs think a clean earnings deck or polished press release is enough. It’s not. Investors aren’t sitting around hoping to connect your dots for you. If your materials don’t speak to how you create long-term value—and how your numbers translate into future opportunity—then you’re not being undervalued. You’re being misunderstood.
Investor communications done right is a strategic weapon. It’s not only about making noise or creating narratives, it’s about teaching the Street how to think about your business, and how to price its future. When you shift from informing to educating, from reporting to inspiring belief, that’s when things start to move.
Teaching for Differentiation — How to Build a Winning Narrative
That same CEO—the one who won investor confidence in a single meeting—didn’t just show up with charisma. She showed up with a strategy.
Spending years on the buy side taught me why certain CEOs could command belief while others, with similar numbers, couldn’t. I started to see patterns—what worked, what fell flat—and I’ve since turned those insights into actionable, real-world consulting that helps leadership teams shift perception and unlock valuation.
Because you can’t just tell investors you’re growing—you have to teach them how to value that growth. That’s where most companies fall short. And where we come in.
Here’s a simplified version of the 3-part framework we use with CEOs who want to build a valuation-ready narrative that holds up under institutional scrutiny:
1. Define a bold but credible equity story.
What makes your company essential, now and into the future. A strong narrative starts with clarity. Your story should articulate your unique market position, the size and urgency of your opportunity, and why your strategy creates durable competitive advantage.
This isn’t about being conservative or bombastic, it’s about being believable. The most compelling equity stories are ambitious but grounded. They show that you understand your market better than anyone else, and that you’re building toward a future investors can’t afford to miss.
With many of the companies we work with, a key unlock comes from reframing their story—not just as high-growth businesses, but as category leaders transforming how their industries operate. This isn’t just spin; it’s about helping the Street see the real strategic shift. When the narrative changes, the valuation lens often follows. And the market responds.
2. Align KPIs that reinforce the narrative.
A story without proof points is just fluff. You need metrics that make your thesis real. Not just revenue and EBITDA—but indicators that tie to your strategic edge: gross margin expansion, net dollar retention, user engagement velocity, churn reduction, or CAC-to-LTV improvements.
And those metrics need context. Investors need to understand not just what they are, but why they matter, and how they’re evolving quarter over quarter. A rising retention rate means one thing in a transactional e-commerce platform and something else entirely in a subscription business, for example. Your job is to make the interpretation obvious and easy for investors to interpret.
One of the most overlooked tactics? Retiring stale KPIs. Too many companies cling to metrics that no longer drive the narrative forward. We help clients evolve their reporting to reflect the next chapter of their story—not the last one.
3. Drive strategic consistency across every investor touchpoint.
From your earnings call script to your IR website to your CFO’s one-liners on the investor day stage—every message must support the same strategic spine.
Consistency doesn’t mean repetition. It means alignment. It means that your CEO, CFO, and Head of IR are all playing from the same playbook, and reinforcing the same investment thesis, in their own voices, every quarter.
Why does this matter? Because mixed signals kill conviction. If your narrative wobbles, so does investor trust. But when everything ladders up—your numbers, your tone, your future outlook—you build the kind of credibility that earns upgrades, not just coverage.
This is the foundation of our Valuation Narrative System™—a proven methodology designed to help companies align their messaging, KPIs, and investor-facing strategy. It’s how we’ve helped undervalued companies transform how the market sees them—often in just a few quarters. [Link to full blog when live]
What’s the Valuation Narrative System™?
Our proprietary framework aligns your investor messaging, KPIs, and strategic narrative—so investors don’t just understand your story, they believe in your upside. Learn more in our full blog: [link once published].
Because narratives don’t drive valuation on their own. But the right one—paired with the right metrics, in the right hands—can be the most powerful financial tool you’ve got.
Equipping Your Internal Champions (Equip Mobilizers)
You’ve got maybe 15 minutes to explain why the stock isn’t moving, and why it’s not IR’s fault. It’s the strategy.
That’s the conversation you’re walking into with your CFO, your IR team, or your management team. And you know the stakes. If you can’t align your internal stakeholders, you won’t align the market. Because if your story is muddled inside the building, it will fall flat on the Street.
Start here: “We’re not being undervalued because we’re underperforming. We’re being misunderstood. And that’s on us.”
Then make it real: “This isn’t about throwing more resources at IR—it’s about rethinking how we present our value to the Street. We need investor communications that actually shape belief. We’re asking people to invest in our future. So let’s show them why it’s worth backing.”
Expect resistance. You’ll hear concerns about cost. About change fatigue. About IR already being ‘under control.’ That’s when you shift the conversation: “This isn’t an indictment of what we’ve done. It’s an evolution. Management wants results. The market wants clarity. And right now, we’re not delivering either.”
The good news? Strategic investor communications is a team sport. And when done right, it makes everyone’s job easier. The CFO gets cleaner narratives to support forecast credibility. The IR team gets a playbook that’s grounded in strategy, not reaction. And the board sees movement where it matters most: valuation.
What we’ve seen work again and again is this: when CEOs frame this shift around leadership, not blame—around value creation, not vanity—internal buy-in follows.
We built the Valuation Narrative System™ for exactly this moment. It’s not about critique—it’s about equipping leadership teams to speak the market’s language with conviction. We’ve helped dozens of CEOs lead this transition with success, and we’re ready to help you do the same.
You don’t need consensus to get started. You need a first step. Let’s take it together.
The Path Forward — From Frustration to Fair Valuation
If your company is executing well but the market still isn’t rewarding you, the problem isn’t performance—it’s perception. And that’s not something you fix with another boilerplate press release or a new set of IR talking points.
Fixing perception requires strategy, built on insight, delivered with conviction, and grounded in real investor psychology. And it has to come from someone who’s been on both sides of the table. That’s what we do. We’ve led IR strategy for multiple IPOs and valuation turnarounds. We know what signals investors look for—and what sets off alarms. We know the difference between noise and narrative, and why even strong businesses struggle when they don’t teach the market how to value them.
You’ve already got the fundamentals. The operational wins. The growth story. Now it’s time for a message that reflects that value and earns the valuation you deserve.
That’s exactly what the Valuation Narrative System™ is designed to do. It’s the culmination of everything we’ve learned from years of investor conversations, boardroom pressure, and public market dynamics. We mentioned it earlier—but it’s worth repeating: this isn’t just a framework. It’s a mindset shift. And it works.
If your stock isn’t telling your true story, it’s time to take control of the narrative.
Ready to go beyond traditional IR and build a narrative that truly resonates with the market? Learn how Resurge's unique expertise can help. Schedule a consultation.
