Asset Managers Dominate #FixedIncome Tweeting Post-Gross

After this post, I’m going on a PIMCO/Bill Gross/Twitter diet, I promise. But, I was looking at some data this week that was too rich not to share.

First, the September 26 announcement that Bill Gross was leaving PIMCO to go to Janus spiked interest in “Bill Gross” as a search term but not so much fixed income. This is according to the Google Trends U.S. data shown below (click on the image to see the data more clearly on the site).

Interest in Janus was far above average search interest while still lower than "Bill Gross."

On Twitter, where Gross' early use of the @PIMCO account influenced how other asset managers began to use Twitter to deliver timely, relevant micro-insights (see post), the news gave a healthy bump to the use of the #fixedincome hashtag.

In the period between September 29 and October 22, 189 users sent 310 tweets with the hashtag, according to Keyhole.co.

The RiteTag graph below of tweets and retweets shows a rush to #fixedincome, relative to its average volume, that has since petered out. 

Competing With Content

Here's what I was interested in. We saw some opportunistic fixed income advertising from fund companies in the days immediately following the news. And, of course, the email factories were working overtime. Did asset managers figure among those jockeying for what would be a burst of fixed income attention on Twitter?

Why yes, they did. The screenshot below from Keyhole.co shows the 32 accounts that used the #fixedincome hashtag most frequently. Twelve belong to asset managers, with @FidelityAdvisor, @NuveenInv, @WFAssetMgmt and @PutnamToday four of the top five accounts. Other firms participated at a lower level. 

In all @FidelityAdvisor sent 37 #fixedincome tweets, most in support of Fidelity Advisor Total Bond Fund. 

@BlackRock takes the honors as the account producing the top #fixedincome tweet (shown below), drawing 18 retweets and 38 favorites. @FTI_US, Putnam and @HartfordFunds were #2, #3 and #4 ahead of @SquawkBox. Sweet.

An investor's dilemma: Net worth and liquidity up, but #fixedincome market slowing down. What to do http://t.co/EnmfOdKmsk

— BlackRock® (@blackrock) September 30, 2014

Everybody Gains

What did the news do to @PIMCO’s enviable follower count? It's happy news all-around.

After a dip—there’s likely some correlation between fund flows and Twitter followers—@PIMCO is back on the rise again, according to TwitterCounter.com.

Meanwhile, @JanusCapital experienced a growth spurt in followers, although still trails @PIMCO by about 174,000.

You Got This

There are very few lightning-in-a-bottle moments for mutual fund and exchange-traded fund (ETF) companies using social media. There’s been no equivalent of seizing the opportunity of a dark stadium to promote dunking an Oreo cookie and watching the Twitter account grow by thousands overnight, for example.

But communications windows open and close on Twitter, and there can be opportunities for alert and agile investment brands. 

On this single hashtag over the last four weeks, more than a dozen fund companies showed up and dominated in a way that rarely happens elsewhere online. (Unfortunately, paying for placement is the only way for many firms to get on page 1 of search rankings of key terms. Other brands got to most of the premium terms first and they’re not budging. See post.) 

For some perspective, fund companies use other hashtags and many to a greater extent. Event hashtags get lots of pick-up, as Morningstar's Leslie Marshall has documented. And, it’s not as if @BlackRock hasn’t been retweeted 18 times before—its maximum is 155 RTs. 

Still, this was a collective demonstration of the communications possibilities for asset managers:

1)using somebody else’s platform

2)and a lightweight, quick turnaround medium

3)to access an "audience" that others helped build and maintain

4)without being constrained by a frequency cap (i.e., Fidelity could have never sent 37 emails in the same time period)

5)to be relevant on a topic

6)that targeted others (financial advisors, media and other influencers) had hyper-interest in and were seeking commentary on.

For those of you in the mix, I hope something good came out of your participation. As for those of you still on the fence about Twitter, does this episode make you any more interested in chiming in?

PIMCO, Janus Left Twitter Out Of The Mix When They Broke Their News

Well, that was disappointing.

PIMCO, the first U.S. asset management firm to take to Twitter (originally using @PIMCO_tweets as an account name) and still the asset manager Twitter account with the most followers, left Twitter out of the communications mix when it broke news on Friday.

On Friday, the firm issued a press release to drop the bomb that co-founder and chief investment officer Bill Gross would be leaving the firm and heading to Janus. Given Gross’ dominance at PIMCO and management responsibility for the $220 billion PIMCO Total Return Fund, this was material information for parent and public company Allianz. Of course, a press release was called for.

Similarly, Janus’ hiring of Gross warranted a press release from that firm and prominent janus.com home page treatment.

But neither PIMCO nor Janus sent a tweet about the Gross news. Yesterday and today, PIMCO posted tweets about the availability of a new article on the fund that Gross managed. The @JanusCapital account posted an unrelated tweet on Friday and nothing since.

Total Return Strategy Team; Q&A with portfolio managers Mather, Kiesel, Worah: http://t.co/UDxDtCUMaS

— PIMCO (@PIMCO) September 29, 2014

A new article, PIMCO Total Return Update, by Scott Mather, Mark Kiesel, Mihir Worah, is now available http://t.co/M8rAFpDb3L

— PIMCO (@PIMCO) September 29, 2014

One can only imagine the crisis planning that drove the communications and coordination surrounding the announcement. There’s the framing of the key messages for multiple audiences/stakeholders, the prepping of the spokespeople, the overall battening down of the hatches for the coming storm.

The “How do we reach them?” question immediately follows “What do they need to know?” in communication planning.

With the salient points already articulated for the press release and other talking points that were no doubt prepared, why weren’t there tweets—“Bill Gross leaving PIMCO” with the link to press release on its site and “Bill Gross joining Janus” with a link—from PIMCO and Janus, respectively?

I don’t get it. Does this reflect executive management lack of appreciation for Twitter and communicators’ failure to sufficiently advocate? Is there so much of a gulf between public relations and marketing? Has it been a while since the plan was updated and Twitter was somehow overlooked? 

This InvestmentNews coverage of advisors’ reaction by Friday morning illustrates what we should all know by now—the decision by PIMCO and Janus not to communicate on Twitter didn't stop the Twitter commentary. Also, see the full search results of tweets mentioning @PIMCO and mentioning @JanusCapital from Friday to Saturday. 

I use this blog to focus on successful strategies and tactics of mutual fund and exchange-traded fund (ETF) firms. But I decided not to hold back today because if PIMCO—of all firms—doesn’t acknowledge the value of Twitter and its Twitter followers, I worry for other asset management marketers working to establish Twitter as a viable communications channel.

This episode provides an occasion to consider what’s in your plan regarding Twitter and communications with breaking news value.

Gross + Twitter 

There was nothing ever remotely social about PIMCO’s Twitter account. It followed exactly one, PIMCO-related account, never re-tweeted and never replied. @PIMCO gained an average of 76 followers a day based almost entirely on the fact that Bill Gross was known to write his own tweets. Back in the day, the account avatar featured not the PIMCO logo but a combined photo of Gross and Mohamed El-Erian, CEO and co-CIO. El-Erian, while gone from PIMCO, continues to be an active Twitter user.

Of course, the so-called Bond King could have scored an appearance in the investment media anytime he wanted. But Gross was early to capitalize on using Twitter to directly share micro-insights, some of which made news themselves. And, displaying more investment executive personality than any other asset management exec on Twitter, Gross often used Twitter to mix things up (see the Carl Icahn kerfuffle).

PIMCO gave Gross what appeared to be full rein of the Twitter account and he turned it into a must-follow. The notion that such an influential, successful money manager would consistently post pithy takes on the markets was irresistible for those looking for an information advantage. Gross’ use of Twitter raised the possibilities and expectations of other investment company Twitter accounts, I believe. And yet those 179,000 followers learned of Gross’ departure from somewhere other than Twitter. Sigh.

By the same token, by choosing not to share its enthusiasm with its 4,000 followers, Janus missed an opportunity to bask in what was mostly goodwill from Twitter this past weekend.

The Risk Of Marginalizing The Channel

Over the last few years, consumers, including investors and financial advisors, have learned to turn to Twitter when news of any kind breaks. Eighteen months ago, the SEC confirmed that public companies can use Twitter and other social media outlets to announce key information in compliance with Regulation FD. 

But is breaking financial news different for some reason? I asked this question in an AdvisorTweets blog post in May 2010, when the flash crash caught everyone by surprise, StockTwits was blowing up and yet the Twitter streams of most Establishment financial services providers including the NYSE continued on their merry, canned announcement ways without commenting on the one event that was drawing the country, even the world’s, attention. Granted, that was early in financial brands’ use of Twitter and the event itself took some sorting out.

There have been several minor events since, repeatedly prompting me to wonder why financial Twitter accounts avoid addressing the real news. To use Twitter to broadcast company news, corporate gift-giving, the availability of product communications but to avoid mention of the real news affecting your firm is to marginalize your followers and the channel. A Twitter account that serves as a go-to source of important information, even the historical record of your firm, has more value than a virtual bulletin board.

While many will have their eyes peeled on the assets in PIMCO funds and where they go, let’s some of us watch the @PIMCO Twitter follower count. Even more interesting: Whether the arrival of Gross will lead to Janus using Twitter in a more expansive way and the growth in followers that will result. 

Update: ZeroHedge this afternoon reported that all Bill Gross tweets have been deleted from the PIMCO account. 

Are Asset Managers Taking The Gloves Off?

After financial services, technology is the industry that I follow most closely. Over the years, I’ve envied much of what technology communicators did that investment managers couldn’t or wouldn’t.

For example, tech companies aren’t content to leave the ranking and evaluating to the media, analysts and other third parties—it’s common for vendors to publish their own comparisons. They want a say in how their company is being positioned vis-à-vis their competitors.

Click to read more ...

Coupla Notes About 4 New Mutual Fund, ETF Websites

Let’s take a quick spin around four new mutual fund and exchange-traded fund (ETF)-sponsored Websites and/or Web presences that surfaced in October.

Janus' Proceed With Caution

Janus is promoting a new domain—proceedwithcaution.com that re-directs to its brand domain. This is a shallow, siloed presence with the top-level pages linking to PDFs for advisors to use when working with clients. It’s a targeted campaign with three clear steps:

Click to read more ...

5 Random Highlights Of Mutual Fund, ETF Websites

Can we agree that mutual fund and ETF Web sites have more similarities than differences? For that, give the credit or blame to American Funds, the mutual fund company whose products are distributed by the highest percentage of financial advisors. If an advisor has already mastered American Funds’ site, so the reasoning goes, who are we to buck the tide and risk the advisor shunning our site because it dares to be different?

It’s a user-friendly call that we suspect has nonetheless had the effect of suppressing creativity or even brand differentiation. That's why when a Web site offers something special, the discovery is an unexpected pleasure. Here’s a random list of what we’ve tripped across in my recent travels on asset management sites. Well done!

A question to the managers of these sites: Are you leveraging them as the link bait you should in order to draw visitors to your site, first to that page and maybe to explore the rest of your value proposition?

1. Fidelity Investments’ Historical Yield Curve
Of all the gorgeous, exciting visualizations of data to be found on the Web today, this isn’t one of them. But it’s a true gem, very, very cool. A site visitor could spend minutes on this page learning. Marketing managers, when it’s time to hire again and you have a green marketing communications staffer, park them in front this.

Click to read more ...