Valmet is not any stranger to the IR Journal Awards – Europe. The Finnish firm has beforehand gained for greatest IR web site, greatest use of multimedia and rising star. This yr, it claimed the prize for greatest retail IR technique – a brand new class on the occasion – because of the inventive means it caters to personal traders.
‘There’s a nice tradition of doing IR rather well and utilizing completely different technological platforms,’ says Pekka Rouhiainen, who joined the corporate as director of IR in September 2019. ‘We’ve been attempting to innovate and construct new issues that stand out.’
A driving pressure behind Valmet’s ingenious method is its massive following of retail traders. The corporate has greater than 57,000 Finnish retail holders, who collectively personal about 14 % of the enterprise. Like many different firms, Valmet noticed its variety of particular person traders rise in the course of the pandemic. In 2020 a brand new sort of financial savings account additionally made it extra tax-efficient for Finns to spend money on shares, attracting extra non-public homeowners.
Whereas Valmet has lengthy supplied a variety of content material and communication channels for its smaller shareholders, in 2020 it tried one thing new with the launch of an IR-focused Instagram channel. On the time of launch, Valmet hadn’t seen anybody else utilizing an Instagram account to speak particularly to traders, says Rouhiainen.
Two-way dialogue
The supplier of expertise for the pulp, paper and vitality industries had two major targets with the channel. Firstly, it needed to offer content material in Finnish for its rising band of retail shareholders. Secondly, it needed to supply an area the place the corporate may have a two-way dialogue with this stakeholder group.
Previous to the pandemic, Valmet would host in-person occasions for personal traders two or 3 times a yr. Instagram affords an internet model of this City Corridor-style engagement by way of its Q&A performance, says Rouhiainen. ‘It replicates these occasions the place there are optimally 100 folks current. You discuss extra freely,’ he explains. ‘It has labored rather well and the engagement has been wonderful.’
The judges on the IR Journal Awards had been impressed not simply by means of Instagram, but in addition by Valmet’s broader method to retail communications. Its different actions embrace utilizing varied social media channels, partaking immediately with monetary bloggers and posting retail-focused Q&As to the web site.
The general purpose is to make details about a posh B2B expertise firm accessible in a fast, easy means. ‘We wish to make it simpler for individuals who don’t spend their complete skilled life following profit-and-loss statements,’ says Rouhiainen.
Valmet’s method has led to a rising following on social media. Collectively, the agency’s social accounts have greater than 1,700 followers, up about 25 % from a yr in the past, and company information is commonly shared and commented on by Finland’s neighborhood of economic bloggers. What’s extra, Valmet appears to have began a brand new pattern: one other Finnish firm has now opened a company Instagram account, notes Rouhiainen.
This text initially appeared within the Fall 2022 subject of IR Journal.
