With the Australian central bank lowering its cash rate and scattered but significant activity in acquisitions and private equity shopping, many investors are detecting the onset of an opportune environment for junior ASX operators seeking to tell their stories.

Taking out a bet on one of the sharemarket's best kept secrets, however, is not just a matter of nailing the timing in a macro cycle.

While many promising companies are unjustly ignored, some plays deserve to be invisible - no matter how hot or cold the market is.

So in hunting the companies with the best chance of success in riding the next wave, investors are best advised to look beyond physical assets. Companies are people, not properties. Innovation, method, leadership, strategy and marketing prowess will therefore be the determining factors in getting noticed and ultimately delivering on a business plan.

Bourse Communications managing director Rod North gives voice to the growing feeling that market interest in the next few years will not be limited to large-caps.

"If you are a small-cap company there are still many ways for the CEO to begin the process of getting the message out while the initial focus is on the big players in the market," he said.

"The success of this approach can ultimately see the company more widely recognised early on, as the attention turns to the small-caps, and eventually create some real wealth for shareholders. If you get this approach right, you could become the next 5, 10, or 20 bagger."

North believes in the power of a good story well told. He told RESOURCESTOCKS that investors would be well advised to consider the competitive edge offered by a well-orchestrated public relations campaign in a noisy, crowded junior market.

"One of the key things is to be able to communicate in a language that the market understands - that's turning it from geo-speak into plain English. We've had many examples of companies in the past where they've announced discoveries, but it's largely done in a language that only geologists would understand."

North flagged Stonewall Resources as a case in point. Stonewall shares have been languishing under 1c for most of this year, despite North noting that the South Africa-focused miner was in "a better position than it ever has been."

Stonewall counted a market cap around $A350 million in mid-2012 but is currently valued just under the $5 million mark. This reflects an almost 100% slide is market cap overlapping a relatively modest 25% fall in the price of gold.

North attributed Stonewall's wallowing in an otherwise reasonably buoyant gold market in part to a lack of clarity in investor communications.

"There's been a disconnect in that particular company with the fact that the gold price hasn't dropped to any huge degree, and their costs of production are well and truly covered with the gold price around the current level," North said.

"You've got to take a range of steps to build your support base, whether they be brokers, analysts, managers, investors, the media or existing investors, which may increase their holding in the company. There're so many different levels."

North emphasised, however, the importance of "mining the ground, not mining the market". The clearest voices may attract the most support, but economically digging up minerals is still the name of the game.

When assessing the intangible strengths of companies unfairly under the radar of the investing masses, the savvy observer often focuses on management resumes and any project-specific experience therein. But as decision-making becomes a more data-driven process across almost all major industrial sectors, investors will have to start analysing the merits of both the bosses and their technological toys.

Companies operating as first movers in technology are basically playing the same risk card as companies operating as first movers in virgin geographic locales. It's a precarious road to follow, but if you get it right, the rewards can be big.

Juniors attaching themselves to expensive, cutting-edge tech programs, however, are not all rolling the same dice. Defusing this risk is sometimes achieved via joint investment, such as AIM-listed Regency Mines' 50:50 venture with ASX-listed Direct Nickel at the Mambare project in Papua New Guinea. Regency is hoping to benefit from Direct's nickel laterite treatment process, which it tipped to cut typical operational and capital expenses by more than half.

For Melbourne-based diversified developer MRG Metals, gaining access to superior tech-based processes was a matter of redefining the company.

In 2013, MRG acquired Sasak Resources Australia in a transformation that reprioritised the company's project portfolio. Perhaps more importantly, the move has focused the merged company on a unique data-driven exploration technique which will inform multi-commodity drilling this year at optimally qualified prospects across Queensland and Western Australia.

Sasak's 10-terrabyte database has afforded MRG a kind of nationwide digital core shed that allows the identification of undercover targets by processing a complex web of algorithms less adventurous explorers wouldn't pause to tackle.

"This process isn't being used by every company because it's a lot of work and most companies don't allow their technical experts the dalliance of creative time," MRG director Chris Gregory said.

"Many big companies don't have a 10-terabyte fully integrated and levelled GIS database like Sasak's. We can go head to head with them all in terms of the data integrity, data availability, and predictive modelling capability.

"By tying up with Sasak, MRG is prioritising where it spends its money. When it comes to regional scale exploration, we're able to focus on the best parts of the belt, rather than just spending money on moose pasture. As the data density increases from regional scale to mine scale, so does the predictive accuracy."

Junior resource companies naturally fill the role of the sector's first movers, whether it's on the ground, in the laboratory or both. They will all have a story to tell, some more effectively than others.

But as North reminds us on the eve of an expected small-cap renaissance, the messenger and the message aren't always one in the same.

"At the end of the day, it's all about mining the ground and getting a result which is sustainable," he said.

"There are instances where companies try to mine the market, get their share prices up, and just as quickly as it goes up, it can come down. Ultimately, it's got to be backed up by what you're doing in the ground."