An IPO success story amid market skepticism

Ping Identity, the Intelligent Identity solution for the enterprise, allows the world's leading companies, including over half of the Fortune 100, to provide trusted employees, partners and customers secure and seamless access to the right applications and data as they move to the cloud and go mobile.

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CHALLENGE

Ping Identity, a long-time Mission North partner and established leader in Identity Security, planned to list on the NYSE in September 2019 at a time when the disappointing public offerings of Uber and Lyft had spooked investors. Mission North had spent the preceding year laying a solid foundation with business, financial and tech media, helping Ping’s executives build strong relationships with the reporters and publications that would matter when its key moment arrived. Our challenge was to position the company as one built to last amid the oversaturated cybersecurity IPO market and rising recession fears.

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STRATEGY

For Ping to combat the doom and gloom in the IPO market, we needed to build a compelling new company narrative and reintroduce CEO Andre Durand as a trusted veteran of the industry. It was also critical to position cybersecurity as the top priority for enterprises in a post-breach era, regardless of market conditions.

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Together, Ping Identity and Mission North rewrote their overarching corporate story to zero in on a company that had successfully played the long game, evolving to meet the needs of enterprises with unmatched credibility.

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We approached Ping Identity’s parent company, Vista Equity Partners, to participate in select interviews with Fox Business and CNBC, running a parallel narrative on the success of Vista-backed entities. Mission North also developed a home-grown success story specifically for Colorado press.

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Finally, we conducted intensive media training for two spokespeople to split the volume of interviews, enabling Andre to confidently handle live TV interviews from the trading floor and capture the excitement of the moment.

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IMPACT

Mission North secured 36 unique articles and broadcast stories including Fox Business, CNBC and the WSJ on the day of the IPO. These stories generated 70 syndications, reaching a collective audience of 266 million. 

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Ping Identity’s share price jumped 30 percent on debut and its executives are fielding a significant increase in requests for their POV on industry trends and for exclusive interviews on quarterly earnings.