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While a devotee of the traditional, drink-in-hand art of social networking, the chairman may take some convincing that Twittering and blogging are an effective way to an investor’s heart.
“So how are you embracing social networking?” I asked the chairman of the implausibly-sized investment company Second Coming Asset Management as we met for a couple of pints of Surely There Can Be No Bigger Accolade For The Freshly Elevated JCR at The Times’s Business Big Shot.
“One drink at a time, of course,” he replied. “Cheers.” “Cheers,” I said raising my glass back at him.
“But that’s not what I meant. The embracement of the social media space by no less a company than Fidelity, which now operates a Facebook site as well as a Twitter page, has got me thinking about the phenomenon’s place within Her Majesty’s financial services industry.”
“Ah,” winced the chairman. “The trouble with that sort of social networking is it just doesn’t seem terribly social to me.”
“So, nothing of the kind for Scam then?” I asked. “Well, never say never,” fudged the chairman. “Apart from anything else, the hundreds of social media conferences around at the moment are as good an excuse to get out of the office as any. But–and one does so hate to sound cynical–I’ve yet to be convinced how much business sense social media makes at the moment. (article continues below)
“Certainly from an adviser point of view, the only time the blogs ever see any real activity is when they’re discussing Cofunds’ charges or the pros and cons of John Maguire. To be honest, I just can’t shake the feeling that any adviser with the time to spend replying regularly to blogs is not the sort of person Scam needs to be doing business with.
”Any adviser with the time to spend replying regularly to blogs is not the sort of person Scam needs to be doing business with”
“Maybe there’s more of a case when it comes to dealing with those dear, dear members of the public on the basis that every little helps but … well, what are the numbers for Fidelity at the moment?” “Oh, I’m not sure that’s terribly fair or representative,” I protested. “After all, they’ve only just started Twittering and posting or whatever.”
“Humour me,” said the chairman. “All right,” I shrugged. “Before I came out to meet you, I noticed Fidelity’s Twitter page had no fewer than 109 followers and was itself following 79 other organisations–including the resplendent organ that is Fund Strategy. As for its Facebook page, there are 57 fans–although I couldn’t help noticing one or two seemed to have corporate connections.”
“Don’t knock it,” said the chairman. “If Scam could boast even a handful of fans, I’d be pretty happy. Anyway, while I accept a thousand-mile journey starts with one step, those numbers would seem to illustrate that one of the country’s largest fund managers has a little way to go to achieve what I suppose might be called critical social networking mass.”
“The fantasy portfolio competition Fidelity are running ought to help boost the ’real punter to employee and PR’ ratio, I’d have thought,” I said. “You never know,” conceded the chairman. “What sort of prizes are on offer?” “The big prize is a not insubstantial 10 grand,” I said. “But there are also monthly prizes of £50-worth of John Lewis vouchers and, if that were not enough …”
“Tell me, tell me,” said the chairman. “The suspense is killing me.” “If the vouchers were not enough,” I repeated, “each monthly winner will receive an invitation to an end-of-year event at Fidelity where they will be able to meet a number of the company’s portfolio managers in person.” “Crikey,” said the chairman. “And is there a second prize?”
“You mean of invitations to two end-of-year events at Fidelity where they will be able to meet a number of the company’s portfolio managers in person?” I replied. “The press release didn’t say. What it did say, however, was that Fidelity recognised that both Facebook and Twitter are a great way to keep in touch with current and prospective investors.
“It also said that the two routes were a similarly fine way to deliver financial information and opinions and gain feedback from interested consumers, and who are we to bet against Fidelity? At the very least, the company can take great comfort from the feedback on the competition from one happy punter–a thumb’s up sign and the resounding endorsement, ’Steven likes this’.”
