Why India's IPOs now rise on storytelling as much as numbers

New Delhi: For decades, the Indian IPO was a compliance-first ritual, statutory ads, dense disclosures, Institutional pitch rounds, and arithmetic-heavy presentations. It was a world built on precision, caution, and a linear exchange of financial information. But as India’s capital markets opened to retail participation, as consumer-facing start-ups became household names, and as social media rewired how trust is built, the IPO has quietly transformed into something much bigger than a listing event.

S Anand, Founder & CEO, PaySprint captured this pivot with absolute clarity when he said, “When I look at today’s IPO landscape, it’s clear we’ve moved beyond investor presentations and balance sheets. An IPO has become a storytelling moment, a culmination of a company’s journey and values.” It’s a sentiment that marks the fundamental rewriting of what the public market expects from companies. The prospectus may still be a compliance document, but the listing process has increasingly become a stage for meaning-making.

This shift is especially visible in how companies prepare for the spotlight. Anand added, “Earlier, it was about numbers and disclosures; now, it’s about trust, purpose, and long-term vision.” And that may well explain why younger companies, even pre-profit ones, are investing years in getting their consumer narrative right before they ever meet a merchant banker.

Sandeep Murthy, Managing Director of Lightbox sees this shift as part of a longer arc. He reminded us that “an IPO has always been an exercise in storytelling, the more important part has always been the story that investors have to buy into.” But the rise of new-age businesses, asset-light, behaviour-changing, culture-shaping has made that story central to valuation. He emphasised that “these new age companies are all about changing the way things are done, the real magic is in how they are going to impact the way we live.”

What’s changed is the medium and the messenger. IPO marketing, once a backroom PR exercise, has moved upstream, right into the heart of brand-building.

The rise of the IPO as a public narrative

This evolution is not accidental. It’s shaped by consumers who have become investors, investors who behave like fans, and founders who intentionally or not have become public storytellers. Sandeep Walunj, Experienced Financial Services Marketer observed this shift from the marketer’s viewpoint, “Creatives have started becoming a brand exercise rather than just legal/compliance pass-down. ‘IPO Campaigns’ increasingly are creativity adhering to statutory guidelines; rather than the other way round!”

Marketing is no longer the garnish; it is the narrative substrate of the listing journey.

This is why companies now begin cultivating public memory long before they go public. Zomato didn’t introduce itself during its DRHP, it had already become part of India’s lexicon. Anand pointed this out too: “Zomato and Mamaearth didn’t wait for the IPO to start telling their stories; they had already earned consumer trust.”

Murthy echoed the same logic from the investor side, explaining that Zomato’s credibility wasn’t built through glossy communication alone. “Zomato did a good job of first getting its business in order and getting to profitability. This then gave them the credibility on which to sell a bigger vision of the future.”

For Mamaearth, the trajectory was bumpier, but revealing. “MamaEarth took a longer path to get there and actually had to first endure a bit of a downturn while they fixed aspects of their business before they were given the leeway to talk about a bigger future,” Murthy said.

In both cases, numbers didn’t replace storytelling; they enabled it. And this isn’t just investor psychology. Walunj captured the changing stakeholder universe perfectly when he said, “TG has expanded from Investors to Citizens.” The IPO has become a civic moment, everyone has an opinion, everyone is participating, everyone is watching.

When creativity meets compliance

But this new storytelling era comes with difficult internal choreography. Anand articulated the conflict bluntly. “This balance is always tricky. Compliance demands precision, while marketing thrives on emotion,” he said.

Murthy mapped this challenge to the heart of communication design: “Storytelling involves helping a listener imagine a future, while compliance based messaging is all about stating current facts.”

The trouble begins when these worlds blur. Murthy warned, “Companies who are going public have to be very careful at calling out when they are helping investors understand their view of the future and delineate that from the fact based aspects of their messaging.”

Walunj sees the same tension play out in execution cycles. “Social conversation moves in minutes while merchant bankers and counsellors need time to ponder over all aspects thoroughly,” he said.

Which is why the only sustainable solution is integrating teams early, shifting from conflict to collaboration. Anand stressed this operational truth: “The key is collaboration, having legal, finance, and brand teams aligned early.”

Why numbers must earn the right to tell a story

One belief is shared across all three experts: marketing multiplies visibility, but it cannot mint trust. Anand is unequivocal, “Marketing spend helps visibility, but credibility can’t be bought; it’s earned.” Yet he also makes an important distinction, marketing is not ornamental. It is catalytic. “Marketing opens the door; fundamentals keep people in the room,” he said.

On the field, that door-opening matters more than many founders assume. Walunj framed marketing as an architecture of influence: “Marketing spend is a critical ingredient in IPO success, not because it manufactures credibility, but because it ensures visibility, clarity, and narrative control in an overcrowded capital market.”

He explained short-term reality: “Money can’t always create credibility in the short term but it can definitely highlight narrative.”

That narrative is where retail investors live. It’s where  finfluencers operate. It’s where public confidence rises or collapses. This is why companies must commit to storytelling before listing, and sustain it after the pop. Anand emphasised this long-term discipline: “The biggest lesson is to build your public narrative early, the IPO should feel like a natural next step in a trusted journey.”

Founders as the faces of trust

In this era, roles are morphing. The founder is becoming the face, and the marketer is becoming the strategist. Walunj noted the shift directly: “Founders are becoming brand ambassadors.” The Zomato and Nykaa examples demonstrated that founders don’t just lead companies, they animate their IPO thesis. At the same time, Anand believed the marketer’s job has expanded: “Marketers today need to think like CFOs and storytellers simultaneously at once.”

The modern IPO marketer must decode regulations, interpret financial metrics, track retail sentiment, manage creators, oversee compliance, and build an emotional narrative across channels. Anand summarised this new hybrid skill-set: “The new marketer must be data-literate, regulation-aware, and emotionally intelligent.”

Walunj listed this evolution with precision: “IPO marketers need to understand DRHPs, Financial constructs, statutory disclosures and ‘indirect’ promotion window as well as they understand media planning.”

Social media: the primary battlefield

Among all media vehicles, one battlefield emerges as dominant: social platforms. Walunj stated it plainly: “Social Media becoming the biggest medium driving financial transactions have further contributed to the eminence of IPO Marketing as a brand storytelling window.” You cannot list publicly without first trending socially.

This is why Zomato’s memes and Nykaa’s influencer ecosystem were not gimmicks, they were infrastructure. Walunj reminded us that “Zomato’s memes, Nykaa’s influencers, Mamaearth’s communities amplified trust. These IPOs were built more by social media than business media.”

Social media lets brands humanise their numbers, manage sentiment in real time, and build communities that feel invested in the company’s success. Walunj articulated this perfectly when he said marketing can “Humanise the Numbers” and “Track & Control Conversations.”

Why post-listing performance now shapes the story

One truth has emerged from recent listings: hype can carry a company to the bell, but only fundamentals can sustain it thereafter. Walunj is blunt about this reality: “the below par post-listing performance has shaped long-term perception far stronger than the listing-day pop.”

This means storytelling cannot end at the listing, it must evolve into governance, discipline, and delivery. Murthy hinted at the same principle when he talks about using numbers as credibility builders, not as the final story. Anand too reinforced this continuity when he said fundamentals “keep people in the room.” The IPO is not the climax, it is the opening scene of public accountability.

The new narrative behind IPOs

A listing is no longer a financial event. It is the moment the world meets the brand. And the story it tells that day, and every day after determines whether the public walks in, stays, and believes. “When your story is grounded in verified data and purpose, creativity becomes a tool for clarity, not exaggeration,” said Anand. Murthy complemented this with a long view. “The big shift will be to understand how to shift between fact based messaging and storytelling,” he added. Walunj completed the picture with executional wisdom: “IPO Marketing has moved from ‘here are our numbers’ to ‘here is our unique story’.”