Question

How can we make people understand how small business can access funds.

Answer

By connecting with audiences where they are, and telling stories that matter.

Funding for small business makes the world go round, but the mechanisms getting the money where it makes a difference can be highly complex.

As a financial institution teaming up with partners such as banks to help entrepreneurs access finance, the work of the European Investment Fund (EIF), happens mostly behind the scenes.

To shine a spotlight on its key role in providing access to finance, we helped the EIF find its audiences on social media.

Tailor-made messages

Audiences differ from one platform to another, and they look for different things. Covering Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn, our strategy for the EIF tailors messages and communication tools to those we are reaching out to on each platform, and their habits.

How many businesses were supported in your region? How is the funding contributing to greener solutions? Engaging original content enables us to get the audiences’ attention while getting – sometimes technical – messages across. These assets range from visuals and gifs to short ad-style videos and event photo and video coverage, combining paid campaigns with targeted analysis of organic results.

We also enlisted the help of influencers to get the word out to business owners and budding entrepreneurs on funding opportunities, for instance in the aftermath of COVID-19. These campaigns, based on the EIF’s Instagram account, helped us reach over 420 000 people.

Since the launch of the Twitter account at the beginning of our collaboration over three years ago, the account has reached over 11 000 followers – a testimony to its success.