How Should IR Professionals Adapt to Social Media's Impact on Investor Communications?
In a digital age dominated by social media, how can Investor Relations professionals stay ahead? Julia Stoetzel unveils the secrets in her Juniversity lecture, offering a deep dive into platform selection, demographic targeting, and content repurposing.
Come 2023, a staggering 5.3 billion people have embraced the internet, accentuating the pivotal role online marketing plays in our lives.
For those immersed in the realm of Investor Relations (IR), the world going online has been nothing short of transformative. It's a conduit that has revolutionized communication, enabling professionals to reach a broader spectrum of investors faster than ever.
With the arsenal of digital tools at any firm’s disposal, the current era presents an unparalleled opportunity to attract potential investors.
But among the different digital channels any Investor Relations professional can tap into, one stands tall in its potential to supercharge IR communication:
Social media.
In this insightful Juniversity lecture, Julia Stoetzel unravels the art and science of sculpting a compelling social media strategy for IR communications. She distills her extensive experience and the lessons she's gleaned over the years into a straight-to-the-point, insightful masterclass that can equip you to build successful social media gameplans that deliver all the right results.
For those charting a course to amplify their IR communication via social media, this session offers a wealth of insights on key learning points, spanning from the fundamentals of choosing platforms to the besst approaches for longevity and consistency. So, if you’re ready to take your IR communications to greater heights so you can scale for success, this session with Julia Stoetzel is a must watch.
Here are some of the most important takeaways from this Juniversity lecture:
Key Takeaway #1: When it comes to choosing a platform to post your Investor Relations communications on, it's important to properly analyze each option and choose a particular set to work with based on the demographics that you want to reach out to. If you want to get the best resultss based on what you’re targeting, consider the details and do additional research to determine the best fit for your target audience.
Here’s what Julia has to say about this:
“As we know, there's a lot of platforms out there and it's almost like a jungle to know which ones to use. And here we also need to think back about who do we actually want to address because the demographics of each platform are very different.”
By doing your due diligence, you’ll get to hit the ground running with your social media-forward IR communication strategy!
Key Takeaway #2: If you want to tap into a younger investor demographic, then TikTok, Instagram, and Snapchat are platforms worth looking into—and for older investors, on the other hand, you're better off leveraging YouTube, Facebook, and LinkedIn to get your message out. As Julia explains:
“And again here's again about knowing who do you want to reach? Do you want to reach super young people, super young investors? Then maybe, perhaps TikTok would be right avenue. If you do want to reach more like the older one or the broad audience, perhaps like a YouTube channel would be the most relevant way to do it. If you want to reach more younger audience generically, I think TikTok, Instagram and also Snapchat is the right avenue.”
Once you determine who you’re trying to market, it becomes much easier to settle on a platform to start working with.
Key Takeaway #3: To make the right decisions with regards to posting business and financial content on social media, it's crucial to look into three key aspects: functionality, compliance, and resources. Instead of choosing a platform solely based on user counts or personal preferences, diving deep into the specifics of every platform you’re considering can clear up which options best suit your needs—Julia emphasizes the need to follow this approach, saying:
“With regards to business content and financial content, I think it's important that you look at the three following aspects. So it's one functionality, for example, Twitter has a 280 character limit, which is really good for quick updates, but not so good if you do want to give a little bit more meat to the bone. The second one is compliance. So do check the compliance around the platforms that you're using. Is this all in line with your legal departments? Are you allowed to use them? Maybe there are some hesitations to check with your legal department if this is something that you feel comfortable around. And then lastly, resources. How much do you need? How time consuming is it to manage these accounts?”
By looking into a platform’s functionality and ability to meet the standards of compliance along with your available resources, you’ll be in a better position to maximize your social media strategy’s results.
Key Takeaway #4: If it's possible, try to choose multiple platforms for your social media strategy so you can tap into a wider range of investors to get your IR communications out to more demographics. With a multi-platform strategy, you get to maximize your reach and send your message out to younger and older investors within a certain period—amplifying your returns, in the process.
Here’s what Julia has to say about this key takeaway:
“And also, there's no reason in not choosing multiple platforms, right? You don't have to go for only one. To get started very quickly and not overthink it, just to start with one platform at a time and see how things are going, if you're actually achieving the results that you do want to achieve, if you want to choose an easy one, I will go for LinkedIn. I think we find the most investors out there and you can choose multiple formats such as video, text, but also picture, and that's just like a low hanging one.”
By leveraging multiple platforms in a single strategy, you leave no stone unturned when generating investor interest on social media.
Key Takeaway #5: Although you might make a piece of IR content for one platform, you can get more mileage out of it by taking the same piece of content and posting it on other platforms. But, make sure to tweak or convert that piece of content if it's not the best format or content type for the additional platforms you're going to post on—as Julia explains:
“I would also recommend you to take the same content and put it onto multiple platforms. So if you're, for example, posting like a picture on Instagram, you can also put it on Facebook and you can also put it on LinkedIn, for example, so you don't have to reinvent the wheel for every single platform out there and it will enable you to get more reach much more rapidly. But if you are very strapped on resources and very limited in your resources, I would recommend you to really go just for that platform and focus on that.”
Once you build a proper repurposing workflow, you can extend the life of your pieces of content and ensure that you get the most value out of them as possible.
Wrap-Up
The digital age has ushered in endless opportunities for Investor Relations professionals. With insights from Julia Stoetzel's Juniversity lecture, it's evident that a strategic approach to social media is not just beneficial—it's essential. From platform selection based on demographics to the importance of compliance and functionality, the roadmap to success is clear.
Watch the full lecture to learn more about social media in IR communications here!
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