MINING and exploration companies are increasingly turning to Facebook to communicate with investors and other stakeholders around the world as the popular social network’s easy publishing tools, vast audience and low costs offer a compelling alternative to other channels.
Facebook’s Pages also enable mining companies large and small to connect with employees in remote geographies. Employees can easily publish photographs and videos with little more than a cellphone. Facebook has more than 500 million active users, 200 million of which access it on mobile devices while more than 70 translations are available on the site.
Last week in London, Facebook’s UK commercial director Stephen Haines caused a stir when he predicted companies’ interactions with their customers could take place so often on Facebook that company websites could become obsolete. He gave examples of companies such as Starbucks and Coca-Cola, which see vastly more activity around their brands on Facebook than they do on their own websites.
Simple publishing tools
Free Facebook pages enable any company to easily publish a stream of news, photographs and videos. They can post event notices and host discussion forums, while hundreds of useful add-ons are available that make it easy to post presentations, documents, polls, and even live video webcasts with attendees able to interact with presenters.
To date, most companies have adopted a fairly simple approach to using their pages on Facebook. They are posting photographs, videos and links to news releases, media articles and video interviews with executives on business television channels. In many ways, company Facebook pages are the corporate newsletters of the digital era.
New services have emerged that specialize in helping companies create and manage their pages. Toronto-based Q4 Web Systems is the first corporate website service provider to enable companies to seamlessly post information on their websites and their Facebook pages at the same time via Facebook’s API. Meanwhile, Vancouver-based RBL Communications is helping several junior mining companies create and manage pages with custom features.
Canadian miners leading
Interestingly, most of the mining companies that are using Facebook are based in Canada, where securities regulations around disclosure on the web lag behind other countries. For instance, while the US Securities and Exchange Commission has recognized that companies’ web channels can meet the public disclosure requirements of Regulation FD, Canadian regulations do not. Indeed, the Toronto Stock Exchange still requires companies to send “full-text” news releases via paid PR wires, regardless of the cost to the many smaller issuers that dominate its listings.
Despite this, the mining companies featured below clearly see significant benefits to using Facebook. For one thing, it enables them to better understand who their stakeholders are and what issues they are interested in. Using Facebook also enables many smaller companies to expand the audience for their stories, due to the ease with which information can spread between Facebook users. And while Facebook is primarily a venue for retail investors, the fact is many thousands of younger financial industry professionals are active users of the site.
Below we highlight 10 mining companies that have set up Facebook pages. We selected this group to show a variety of use cases, audience sizes and page designs. For each company we summarize what content and applications they provide on their pages. As an indicator of how open a company is to user contributions, we show if fans are allowed to post their own content on the company’s wall and if user comments are expanded. Finally, we summarize the types of pages the company includes in its own favorites.
1. Barrick Gold Corporation
URL: http://www.facebook.com/barrick.gold.corporation
Fans: 2783
Landing page: Wall
Users can post: No
Expand comments: No
Apps used: Links, Photos, Jobs
Favorite pages: Yes, mostly mining associations, environmental and community groups. Also Nova Gold, a partner.
Our thoughts: A lot of links to external media about the company, including video interviews and news articles. Barrick has the highest number of fans among the companies in the list, which is both a factor of its profile in the industry and its longevity on Facebook. There’s a reasonable amount of user activity around Barrick’s posts, but preventing anyone else from posting and hiding comments by default makes them less open than other companies. That’s not surprising given that the company has been a target for community and environmental activists.
2. Agnico-Eagle Mines
URL: http://www.facebook.com/AgnicoEagle
Fans: 895
Landing page: Wall
Users can post: Yes
Expand comments: Yes
Apps used: Photos, Video
Favorite pages: Spanish TV psychologist Silvia Olmedo, which is not explained.
Our thoughts: This is what real social media looks like. It’s messy, honest and sometimes brutal, just like the realities of mining. It’s probably the least structured and controlled page among the larger companies. Has a mix of employee, community and IR content that gives you a real sense for the company’s culture and personality. In some ways, it feels a little strange that they give so much freedom to their fans and mix earnings announcements in with employees posting pictures of their kids. On the other hand, it’s real, honest and says more about what this company stands for than any amount of expensive corporate PR could ever achieve. People really like this company.
3. Taku Gold
URL: http://www.facebook.com/takugold
Fans: 106
Landing page: Custom welcome page
Users can post: Limited to messages and tagged posts
Expand comments: No
Apps used: Events, Discussions, Photos, Video, RSS Grafiti, FBML custom tabs include a great news page.
Favorite pages: Three industry related but the most prominent is to RBL Communications, which manages the page
Our thoughts: Great examples of what you can do with a bit of know-how and good ideas. It’s a well-designed page that makes use of a lot of customization. It’s designed and managed by RBL Communications, which specializes in Facebook Pages for IR. They’re doing good things, but the service provider should be in the background, not listed at the top of the list of favorite pages.
4. NovaGold Resources Inc.
URL: http://www.facebook.com/NovaGold
Fans: 222
Landing page: Custom tab urging you to like page
Users can post: Yes
Expand comments: Yes
Apps used: Photos, Events, Discussions and 3 custom tabs
Favorite pages: Yes, mostly pages from the places they operate. They like Barrick and Teck Resources.
Our Thoughts: This page has a strong community feel about it, while the custom tabs show that they’ve putting some effort into the page. The company encourages contributions, and recently ran a contest to encourage people to submit photographs. While they use the Events app, they do so inconsistently. The Discussions tab was empty. The lack of video content is a missed opportunity. Overall, though, this page is on the right track and a place where everyone will feel welcome.
5. Commerce Resources Corp.
URL: http://www.facebook.com/commerceresourcesfan
Fans: 235
Landing page: Wall
Users can post: Yes
Expand comments: Yes
Apps used: Photos, Video, Links, Notes, Events, SlideShare, YouTube
Favorite pages: One, Zimtu Capital
Our thoughts: Makes use of a lot of multimedia and apps. One of the few that use the Facebook Events app well. Clearly someone at the company knows what they’re doing because this is a well managed page.
6. TVI Pacific
URL: http://www.facebook.com/tvipacific
Fans: 265
Landing page: Wall
Users can post: No
Expand comments: Yes
Apps used: Discussions, Notes, Links, Photos
Favorite pages: Calgary Stampeders football team
Our thoughts: The highlight is the Discussion Forum, which no other page in this list does better. TVI mostly posts links to news that has appeared on its website. Would be nice to see some video of properties and of management. The events app also should be used for company activities and there should be more favorite pages.
7. Goldcorp
URL: http://www.facebook.com/Goldcorp
Fans: 692
Landing page: Wall
Users can post: No
Expand comments: No
Apps used: Notes, Photos, Events Video,
Favorite pages: None
Our Thoughts: Activity has declined as the company seems to be paying less attention to the page. While it uses the Events app, all the events are old. Heavy restrictions on user posts and comments may be impacting user interest.
8. Reed Resources
URL: http://www.facebook.com/ReedResources
Fans: 174
Landing page: Wall
Users can post: Yes, but no photos or video
Expand comments: Yes
Apps used: Photos, Issuu, Discussions, Video
Favorite pages: None
Our Thoughts: Based in Australia, it’s the only non-Canadian company on the list. The highlight here is the use of the Issuu document sharing service app to post various documents, including analyst research. The discussion forum has no posts and no videos are posted, yet they’re shown as tabs.
9. Vena Resources Inc.
URL: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Vena-Resources-Inc/160088440668878
Fans: 138
Landing page: Wall
Users can post: No
Expand comments: Yes
Apps used: Videos, Photos, Links, YouTube
Favorite pages: Pearl Bar & Dining
Our thoughts: This page has some personality and a community feel. They even post the odd music video for their geologists. Not sure why Pearl Bar & Dining is a favorite on their page, though.
10. Apella Resources Inc.
URL: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Apella-Resources-Inc/126421967379753
Fans: 183
Landing page: Wall
Users can post: No
Expand comments: Yes
Apps used: Photos, Video, Links, YouTube
Favorite pages: None
Our Thoughts: They use YouTube a lot, but there’s not much else happening here. Posts are too sporadic. The page is crying out for someone to manage it.
Parting thoughts
Many pages have tabs with no content in them. Apart from TVI, all of the discussion boards were near or entirely empty. It may be better to turn off the discussion app and let people post to the Wall.
Good pages need active management, and users should be allowed to post content. Pages that block users from posting leave a negative impression. There are ways to discourage nuisance posts without blocking good users.
Pages don’t have to have advanced features like custom tabs to be effective. Just keep the Wall current and be available to answer questions and interact with users.
Dominic (bio & disclosures) is IR Web Report‘s founder and an online investor relations consultant. He advises leading public companies and investor relations service providers worldwide on using the web for disclosure, engagement and profile building. You can contact him via the contacts page.
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