Редакция журнала «Позитивные изменения»
Позитивные изменения. Том 2, № 1 (2022). Positive changes. Volume 2, Issue 1 (2022)
Тональность упоминаний в социальных медиа немного отличается от традиционных СМИ. Если в СМИ преобладали позитивные инфоповоды, то здесь сообщения имеют в основном нейтральный оттенок. В отличие от СМИ, в социальных медиа встречаются негативные посты на тему импакт-инвестирования, но их немного – всего 0,3 %.
В социальных медиа чаще всего упоминаются те же организации, которые фигурировали в топ-списках традиционных СМИ. Первая пятерка – это IxD Capital, фонд «Навстречу переменам», Impact Hub Moscow, инвестиционный импакт-клуб «Хедлайнеры», ВЭБ.РФ. Заметим, что IxD Capital, инвестиционная компания, специализирующаяся на импакт-инвестициях, была также в списке центральных игроков рынка социальных инноваций в разделе «Термин «импакт» в социальных медиа», но при этом редко встречалась в публикациях СМИ. Впрочем, это может быть связано с количеством сообщений, автором которых выступили сами IxD Capital: при 994 упоминаниях в социальных медиа перу команды компании принадлежит больше тысячи сообщений на различных платформах, что делает ее статистическим лидером и в этой рубрике. Второе и третье место занимают фонд «Навстречу переменам» и Impact Hub Moscow соответственно. Высокого количества упоминаний в социальных медиа добилась их совместная программа «Навстречу импакт-инвестициям». Для сравнения можно рассмотреть особенности продвижения той же программы в традиционных СМИ. У сообщений о программе высокая событийная насыщенность, имеется определенный сценарий их размещения (анонсирование мероприятия – освещение – итоги). В большинстве инициированных организаторами постов повторно подчеркивались цели и задачи, которые решает программа. Во многих таких постах и комментариях к ним содержались отзывы участников программы, что должно было способствовать большей вовлеченности. В продвижении программы было задействовано сразу несколько платформ, в том числе и новые (организаторы заявили о себе в соцсети Clubhouse, когда та была на пике своей популярности). Такая методика продвижения позволила добиться высокой вовлеченности (4180 реакций за рассматриваемый период) и широкого охвата (109 тыс. пользователей).
В отличие от традиционных СМИ социальные медиа более прагматичны. Они подчеркивают, что финансовая отдача – такой же неотъемлемый аспект импакт-инвестирования, как и позитивный социальный эффект, а также выражают посыл, что импакт-инвестирование и благотворительность – сферы, концептуально отличные друг от друга.
Можно отметить, что участники отрасли ведут совместную целенаправленную работу для продвижения культуры импакт-финансирования. Рынок консолидирован: игроки реализуют совместные программы, проводят дискуссионные мероприятия, задействуют приглашенных экспертов и освещают свою деятельность в соцсетях.
Что почитать: полный текст исследования «Импакт и импакт-инвестиции. Анализ семантической структуры образа в традиционных СМИ и социальных медиа».
https://bit.ly/320IiWE
Impact and Impact Investing in Traditional and Social Media
Vsevolod Muronets
DOI 10.55140/2782-5817-2022-2-1-44-53
The terms «impact» and “impact investing” have long been used in Russian media but haven't yet been studied from the informational perspective. In 2021, PR News conducted a research on impact and impact investing at the request of SOL Social Innovation Support Center. The results provide new insights into the Russian impact investing market.
Vsevolod Muronets
SOL Social Innovation Support Center
The research aimed to analyze posts and articles published from April 1 5, 2020 to April 1 5, 2021 and had two main objectives: 1) to analyze the informational presence of the terms "impact” and "impact investing" in traditional media and on social media; 2) to explore the semantic structure of impact investing. Russian traditional and social media outlets were used as data collection sources.
For each objective, a different analytical framework and a specific set of parameters were used. The analysis of the informational presence of the term "impact” in traditional media considered the following parameters:
• mention dynamics;
• event flow structure;
• top sources and platforms;
• tone of discussion;
• engagement and coverage (for social media).
The semantic analysis of the term "impact investing” aimed to identify words, word forms, categories, and attitudes most frequently used in traditional media and on social media in relation to this term. The Medialogia system was used for monitoring a wide range of media sources with the exception of news aggregators, press release distribution services, and official government websites. YouScan was chosen for social media monitoring.
THE TERM «IMPACT» IN TRADITIONAL MEDIA
During the period under review, the term "impact” received 1,801 mentions in traditional media, being used by an average of around 138 sources a month. Notably, only 6 % of them placed a special emphasis on it by putting the word "impact” in the headline.
It's worth noting that the term "impact” was often used in meanings other than "social influence”. It was most frequently mentioned in the coverage of sports and esports (36 % of the total number of mentions) as well as in the articles on science and education (36 % of the total number of mentions). In both cases, the high percentage of mentions was due to news stories that had no connection to social entrepreneurship and innovations. Most scientific papers discussed the impact factor of science journals, which is a measure reflecting the average number of citations to articles published in science journals, regardless of whether they address the topic of social impact or not. In sports media, the Montreal Impact football club received the highest number of mentions, with its name being mentioned in 370 articles. In esports, the word "impact” was used to refer to weapon damage in video games.
When similar meanings of the two terms are concerned, it can’t be said that “impact” has significantly more mentions than “impact investing.”
This doesn't mean that traditional media shows no interest in the term "impact” in the meaning of "social impact” or ignores it completely. 13 % of the total number of mentions are associated with the impact economy. They include articles on social projects and entrepreneurial activities aimed at bringing positive changes to social processes. Among the articles on the impact economy, the highest number of mentions was received by Impact Hub Moscow, a center for social innovation that runs the 90 Days Challenge incubation program for Russian impact projects. It should be noted that the company doesn't just have the word "impact” in its name but also uses it in the names of most of its projects, such as the Social Impact Award.
The art and culture sector was also concerned with social changes (3 % of the total number of mentions), with the most media attention focused on the impact of film production, which is a topic related to the impact economy. The highest number of mentions was received by the National Media Group with its Headliners: Impact Media project, which aims to promote content driving positive social changes.
The articles on the space industry make up 7 % of the total number of mentions, with the word "impact” being primarily used in the names of space programs and missions. The main space news sources include Roscosmos, the International Space Station, and NASA. In the research, the key sources were similarly identified for each subject area.
To summarize, the research identified three main characteristics of the informational presence of the term "impact” in traditional media:
1. The articles on economy and culture use the term "impact” almost identically, placing the main focus on social good. In some articles on entrepreneurial initiatives, the term "impact” is used synonymously to "CSR” (corporate social responsibility).
2. In sports and the space industry, the word "impact” is encountered mostly in names, such as Montreal Impact, Impact Wrestling (American wrestling promotion), the Impact experiment (Roscosmos project), and Deep Impact (NASA space probe).
3. The education and science sector has its own understanding of the term "impact” (briefly outlined above) not related to any particular topic and used in the coverage of random news stories.
Therefore, although the interpretation of the term "impact” varies considerably depending on the context in which it is used, the core semantic meaning of the term can be identified: effect, influence, or contribution.
THE TERM “IMPACT INVESTING” IN TRADITIONAL MEDIA
The term "impact investing” was encountered in traditional media less frequently than the word "impact.” During the period under review, it received 580 mentions ("impact” was mentioned 1,801 times). However, it should be noted that the word "impact” was often used in meanings other than "social influence.”
With impact investing, the situation is different. The term is unambiguous in its meaning, and the articles that mention it are thematically more consistent, which means that when similar meanings of the two terms are concerned, it can't be said that "impact” has significantly more mentions than "impact investing.”
Thematic consistency also manifests itself in the number of times the term "impact investing” was put in the headlines and used as the central subject of the articles: 17 % of the headlines mention impact investing while only 6 % mention impact.
Most articles on impact investing address the same subject and never mention businesses, organizations, and projects not associated with social innovations (the full list of them can be found in the research).
Thematic consistency made it possible to identify the main trends of impact investing representation in traditional media. The emphasis in the articles was usually placed on impact investing being the new economy trend. It was described as a "new direction,” "business strategy of the future.” "New mechanism,” "social revolution,” etc. Considerable attention was also paid to the fact that impact investing is a form of responsible financing. The following expressions were used: "a benefit to society,” "a contribution to the development of mankind,” "an investment in the future.” Apart from that, many articles strived to differentiate investing from charity, using the expressions like "efficiency and financial return are expected from the investments,” "impact investing has nothing in common with charity.”
The study also identified some key individuals involved in impact investing, both in the context of media articles and professionally. Among them were Ronald Cohen, the Chairman of the Global Social Impact Investment Steering Group (GSGII), Nyuta Federmesser, the founder of VERA Hospice Charity Fund, Mikhail Paley, the Co-founder and CEO of the Impact Investors Association, social entrepreneur Ruben Vardanyan, and other notable figures. The highest number of mentions was received by Ilya Zibarev, the co-founder and mentor of the Towards Impact Investments program, and Lyubov Sherysheva, the author of the program's idea.
In terms of content, the articles can be described as mainly positive (68 % of the total number of articles). The top news stories covered positive developments initiated by the people and organizations mentioned above. According to the authors of the research, the neutral articles (which constitute the remaining 32 % of the total number of articles) included formal event announcements and contextual mentions in market reviews and financial research. No negative news stories related to impact investing were published in traditional media within the period under review.
The headlines can be divided into three main groups:
• Informational headlines lack expressiveness and mainly serve for information and announcement purposes, with the emphasis generally placed on the novel nature of the industry. Events and products mentioned in this type of headlines are presented as new to the market.
• Instructional headlines are aimed at explaining the key principles and mechanics of impact investing and make up a group referred to as “How and Why.”
• Personified headlines mention key market players.
The media outlets that published articles on impact investing were also divided into several groups. 84 % of the articles were posted on online media platforms. The least number of mentions was encountered in printed media (3 %), and news agencies mentioned the term “impact investing” only slightly more frequently (13 %).
Impact investing was more frequently mentioned in federal media (53 %) than in local media outlets (47 %). In regard to the subject, most mentions were found in social and business media outlets, followed by non-profit organizations, finance, and corporate media.
Many articles strived to differentiate investing from charity, using expressions like “efficiency and financial return are expected from the investments".
The study also identified the top sources in terms of coverage and activity. It turned out that although many major media outlets (RBC, Komsomolskaya Pravda, TASS, and others) published articles on impact investing, only Forbes.ru covered the topic on a regular basis.
The Towards Impact Investments program can be viewed as an illustrative example of how an impact investing program is promoted in traditional media. As it turned out, the program's wide media coverage was achieved by using the expertise of its participants. The news stories mentioned the names of renowned experts and were regularly commented on by the program's organizers and guest speakers. The significant segment of the media field was formed by event coverage that encouraged dialog (debates, conferences, online discussions, etc.) and allowed the program's experts to show their willingness to share their experience and answer questions. To attract attention, the articles used a lot of expressions with educational connotations, such as “will teach you how to attract investments,” "offer educational opportunities,” and “will learn how to make money.” The articles also aimed to create a stable positive image of impact investing. To achieve this purpose, they regularly mentioned the key objectives of the program and the issues it addressed, or, in other words, repeatedly summarized its key ideas. The focus of the information flow was directed towards the provinces, with 77 % of the materials being published in local media outlets. In other words, the Towards Impact Investments program's promotion strategy was different from the general pattern of focusing on federal media.
THE TERM «IMPACT» ON SOCIAL MEDIA
The social media situation is similar to the one observed in traditional media, with the word "impact” being mentioned in a lot of posts. In the period from April, 2020 to April, 2021, the term received 73.7 thousand mentions, with an average of 5.7 thousand mentions a month. More than half of them were made by different authors, and the total number of unique authors was 46.3 thousand. The total number of engaged users was 3.9 million.
However, only in some cases the term "impact” was used in connection with social entrepreneurship and system changes. Most posts (54 %) were related to esports and video games. Similar to traditional media, they used the term "impact” in the meaning of "contribution to the game” or "weapon efficiency.” The high percentage of mentions was also explained by the popularity of the Genshin Impact video game. The term received far less mentions in science-related social media posts (9 %), where it was used in the same meaning as in traditional media. The term "impact' in relation to social entrepreneurship was encountered only in the economy sector (5 %).
Most views were received by the posts about the Impact Fest 2021 meetup. The word "impact” was often used as part of the economy-related expressions, such as "impact economy (502 mentions), "impact entrepreneurship” (258 mentions), "impact business” (150 mentions), etc.
Since any user can post their message on social media, there are even fewer restrictions on usage contexts than in traditional media. The term "impact” often appears in social media posts as a semantic borrowing from the English language and can have a number of different meanings synonymous to "influence,” "benefit,” or "effect.” For example, "the question of how to minimize the impact on the child's psyche should be addressed to professional psychologists,” "it has the minimum impact,” or "scooters are an impact for people who love to travel around big cities…”
Therefore, the term "impact” is used on social media by different segments of the audience, which are either indirectly connected to each other or not connected at all. In the context of most topics, it is used without any reference to the current news and events. Synonymous mentions of the word "impact” are encountered often, and it is frequently used in everyday speech. Basically, the word can be used in any context. The exception is the sphere of economy where the bursts of interest to the term "impact” coincide with major industry events. Business-related posts include the announcements of events and programs, articles on social entrepreneurship, posts announcing the start of new projects and initiatives, and job offerings. Impact Fest 2021 was the biggest event that took place during the period under review.
THE TERM “IMPACT INVESTING" ON SOCIAL MEDIA
The mentions of the term "impact investing” on social media are thematically consistent and unambiguous in their meaning, as is the case with traditional media. The main representation patterns are similar to those observed in traditional media.
The "responsible financing” semantic category is represented most widely on social media, with corporate social responsibility being acknowledged as the main advantage of impact investing compared to traditional investing. Additionally, impact investing is positioned as "the approach of the future.” This creates an image of impact investing as a promising and developing approach that will be an integral part of the future world of finance. The emphasis is also placed on its financial benefits. This aspect is revealed in analytical posts, expert comments, educational content, and other messages directed at potential investors, where it is important to emphasize the financial attractiveness of impact investing. Considerable attention is also given to breaking the stereotypical perception of impact investing as a compromise between profitability and social transformation, with the main message being that impact investing is not charity.
An average social media post covers 2.7 thousand users, and the overall potential coverage of all social media posts within the period under review is 10.8 million users. Facebook[2] is the main platform for discussing impact investing on social media, accounting for 45 % of all posts. Twitter covers a wide audience with a minimum number of posts due to impact investing being mentioned by major media outlets (Forbes) and large organizations (Tele2, All Russia People's Front). However, the widest coverage was received by VK posts, with impact investing being mentioned a fewer number of times than on Facebook (576 mentions compared to 1,793 mentions) but the posts being viewed by 3.1 million users. However, Facebook had the highest engagement rate with 17,365 reactions to posts, being followed by YouTube with 10,908 reactions. In terms of average engagement rate per post, YouTube takes the first place with an average of 47 reactions on a video. The maximum number of reactions was received by business accounts that post interviews (Sergey Guriev, Oskar Hartmann, Ilya Rudnev, etc.). Instagram*, with its traditionally high engagement rates, doesn't prove to be particularly effective when impact investing is concerned. The mention dynamics across all platforms correlates with the events, with the peak number of mentions being registered during the Impact Investing as the Driver of Human Capital Economy conference.
In traditional media, most news stories were positive, while on social media, most posts were neutral.
The tonality of social media mentions was slightly different from the tone of traditional media. In traditional media, most news stories were positive, and on social media, most posts were neutral. Unlike in traditional media, negative posts on impact investing were found on social media, but they accounted for only 0.3 % of the total number of mentions.
The organizations most frequently mentioned on social media were the same as in the traditional media top list. The top five were IxD Capital, the Towards Changes fund, Impact Hub Moscow, the Headliners impact club, and VEB.RF. It should be noted that the IxD Capital investment company was also in the list of the major players of the social innovation market that mentioned the term "impact,” but it was rarely mentioned in traditional media. This might be related to the number of posts published by IxD Capital themselves. During the period under review, the company received 994 social media mentions and published over a thousand posts on different platforms, which makes it a statistical leader in this section too. The second and third places were taken by the Towards Changes fund and Impact Hub Moscow respectively. Their joint program called Towards Impact Investments also received a significant number of social media mentions. This can be compared to how the same program was promoted in traditional media. The social media coverage of the program was eventful and used a specific posting scenario (announcement – coverage – results). Most posts published by event organizers listed the program's objectives and the issues it aimed to address. Many posts and comments included the participants' reviews of the program, which was supposed to increase the level of engagement. Several platforms were involved in the promotion, including new ones (for example, the program was covered on Clubhouse, which was on the peak of its popularity at that time). This promotion strategy helped to achieve a high level of engagement (4,180 reactions within the period under review) and wide coverage (109 thousand users).
In contrast to traditional media, social media are more pragmatic. They emphasize that the financial profit is an integral aspect of impact investing along with the positive social effect, and communicate the message that impact investing and charity are two conceptually different things.
It can be noted that the members of the industry work together with the purpose of promoting the impact investing culture. The market is consolidated, and its members implement joint programs, organize discussions, invite experts, and promote their initiatives on social media.
Further reading: full text of "Impact and Impact Investment. Analysis of the semantic structure of an image in traditional and social media" research.
https://bit.ly/320IiWE
