Finfluencers loom large in world of ETFs

Financial Times

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In recent years a growing number of asset managers have sought influencers’ help to boost brand awareness and promote their funds. Fund managers have struck agreements with influencers who have built a significant following and who endorse the companies or products on their platforms.

Invesco, for example, recently worked with retired WNBA legend Candace Parker. In an April Instagram post, she compared her growth as a basketball player to the process of launching a career in investing.

“When you’re young and you’re trying to figure out your game, right, you try and stick with the basics. So you want to hit a game-winner, you go to your safe move, and I think that that’s how you start off your career in investing,” Parker said.

Invesco partnered with Parker to promote its $247bn flagship Invesco QQQ ETF this year, according to Matthew Heath, chief marketing officer for the Americas and Emea.

This article was previously published by Ignites, a title owned by the FT Group.

Invesco has also worked with other influencers to boost its brand.

“Bring innovation to your kitchen with the 5 recipes I created with @InvescoUS for its Recipe for Innovation series,” Marcus Samuelsson wrote in a mid-April Instagram post.

About 700,000 people follow the celebrity chef’s Instagram account.

Invesco’s Recipe for Innovation series promoting the QQQ fund also features other celebrity chefs, including Kristen Kish and Kwame Onwuachi.

As part of the campaign, the chefs were tasked with creating a total of 25 unique dishes inspired by the 25 companies in the QQQ product.

BlackRock has also experimented with an influencer incentive programme that promotes its line-up of iShares products, according to a disclosure on its website.

The company “periodically” invites social media influencers to attend events and gives them gifts and entertainment, rather than cash compensation, that “may incentivise” them to create content favourable to BlackRock, according to the disclosure.

The group claims that the incentives per individual are not anticipated to exceed more than $1,000 over a 12-month period.

The company declined to comment on its incentive programmes.

New York-based ETF provider KraneShares has been using online influencers to promote its strategies since the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic, during which marketing opportunities from conferences became effectively closed, according to the manager’s head of marketing and media, Joseph Dube.

“Influencers are probably one of the most effective strategies,” he

The full article is available here. This article was published at FT Markets.