A well-established green tech firm wanted to understand the reputation and regulatory risks they were exposed to before their next investment round.
The business held a significant first-mover advantage, established by coming to market with a sophisticated tech stack 18 months before any competitors, and they wanted to maintain this by mitigating as much risk as possible and identifying opportunities to stay ahead.
Operating in the sustainability space, the business was facing increasing regulation and reporting requirements from the Advertising Standards Authority, Competition and Markets Authority (specifically the Green Claims Code) and the Financial Conduct Authority. They needed to ensure compliance and stay ahead of incoming regulatory changes that might affect their operations or communications.
181st Street’s team of analysts and reputation specialists were commissioned to analyse the company’s risks, provide recommended mitigation strategies and map out incoming regulatory changes the company should be aware of.
To understand the full scope of their reputation risks, we began by producing a detailed stakeholder analysis. This identified priorities and expectations from their investors, staff, clients and other key stakeholders.
We mapped their customer journey for each product and ongoing customer service and support, to fully understand the brand experience from an end-user perspective and identify any areas for improvement and optimisation.
We then undertook media monitoring, social listening and sentiment analysis to identify any relevant themes and risks, taking into account both the company’s current position and the 24 month future roadmap, to ensure potential future risk areas were highlighted and included.
This exercise provided our client with valuable insights into how their stakeholders viewed and engaged with the firm and its products. It highlighted a range of media opportunities, outlets and key influential publications that the client should be engaging with, which we were able to embed in their PR strategy going forward too.
To identify risks in the wider marketplace, we undertook a detailed competitor analysis, including brand audits, media monitoring and sentiment analysis for their 5 biggest and most significant competitors.
Finally, we audited the client’s website, adverts and marketing materials for Green Claims Code compliance, and produced a detailed roadmap of current and upcoming regulatory requirements that the client must comply with, including guidance on areas where changes would be needed to meet these requirements.
The client received a full risk report, grading the risks from severe to minor to help them prioritise, with detailed mitigation recommendations prepared by our reputation team.
We supported senior leadership to fully understand the risk report, regulatory requirements and next steps with a debrief session, and helped managers across the organisation turn the recommendations into a workable action plan for their teams.
By the end of the process the client had clear visibility on a series of reputation risks, and the sources of those risks, as well as upcoming regulatory changes, that they had previously been unaware of.
Within 3 months of receiving the final report and working with our team, all major risks had been mitigated following our recommendations and they were able to maximise valuation and open their next round of investment.
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