With much of proxy season now behind us in the US, IR Magazine caught up with Cathy Conlon, head of corporate issuer strategy at Broadridge, to hear how issuers have approached engaging with their retail investors this year.
Speaking to IR Magazine at the NIRI annual conference, Conlon said: ‘It can be expensive to reach your individual investors. One of the things we try to help our clients with is how to make the most of the impact from things they’re already doing, rather than trying to do a lot more. There’s a lot of people you have to reach on the retail side.’
Conlon explains that issuers are increasingly taking a blended approach of traditional process around retail investor engagement – such as mailing hard copies of the proxy statement and enhancing the branding on physical mail to make it apparent to investors that they should open the package – and newer digital approaches, like social media campaigns, digital proxy statements and SMS communication with investors.
On the use of social media for proxy engagement, Conlon says Broadridge has seen encouraging levels of engagement from retail investors on Facebook, but notes that there aren’t many issuers using the platform.
Click here to view the full video interview with Conlon and to access the archive of videos from the NIRI national conference.
