Leveraging the power of diaspora for investment promotion

If there is one thing that anyone can speak with excitement and passion when one is in a foreign country, it is about one’s own homeland. Every nation has thousands and sometimes millions of their countrymen staying in some foreign country on a temporary or permanent basis. From the point of view of promoting attractiveness of a location, it is this people power that could be leveraged for luring investors.

Diaspora or expatriates can be classified into various ways but the important categories could be businessmen, working executives and students. All these are important from the point of view of location promotion. These are like your website-active and alive 24x7 in some part of the world tuned in to what’s happening and experiencing, in the part of the world they are staying.

Quite obviously, one is more glued in to local information. He would know about the weather, the stores, pubs, restaurants, parks etc. in his part of the world. He would most certainly be also aware about the business and the economy and about local companies making news. He may also have access to information about which companies are growing, expanding or possibly, looking for overseas investment opportunity. It is this information that is crucial for the home country in terms of promoting a location as an investment destination. These are useful leads.  So how does one channelize and leverage this information and leads?

A notable example is that of the investment agency of Ireland which introduced a reward program which pays one for any qualified lead of an investor. Of course, this wasn't only meant for only the Irish diaspora but for anyone who could pass on an investment lead. Quite innovative and may have been a success benefiting both the agency and those who passed information on leads. I think this may have resonated quite well with Irish diaspora staying in other countries since there is a monetary benefit also involved.

Having a systematic approach for location promotion by leveraging the power of the diaspora could prove quite useful.  A good starting point would be to generate a database of diaspora.  Ideally, from those locations which are target countries for attracting investment. Generating this data could be quite simple since those staying abroad tend to organise themselves in some sort of a community group. It could be a business association, a student’s group or a social/cultural group.  The High Commission may also have access to such groups and possibly all individuals. The second step is to communicate to them about the importance of this initiative and how this could result in the community getting benefited. For example, a new company setting up operations would result in creating employment which would ultimately benefit people back home. While monitoring information and passing on this data is good, this could be a passive effort and certain information may be repetitive. Like for example, news about a potential company expanding, published in a newspaper may be known by many and therefore, the same information could be passed by different individuals. 

So how does one follow a more proactive approach? What could be useful is the diaspora having conversations with their colleagues, acquaintances and speak about their city, country, region whenever there is any such opportunity. For such conversations to be effective, the message should be uniform and convey important highlights about the region so that it generates interest. It should be kept brief and well articulated. Information about places, its peculiarities, specialties, cuisine etc. are generally interesting and people like to listen about it, especially in a foreign land so these conversations could centre around this. As much as possible, one must avoid airing views on politics, religion, disputes or any topic which may seem controversial and may just run into an argument or debate. It’s possible that conversations like these could throw up some useful information about potential leads, if smartly done. In any case, this would definitely help in raising the profile of the place which would benefit the country’s image in the long run. If the message is uniform, a clear identity of the place would be communicated which is a good news from a marketing/branding perspective.

I think by following the above steps, one could leverage the presence of diaspora and make meaningful gains in promoting a location. Like any other initiative, this effort has to be consistent and also ensure that the investment agency is equally responsive in handling any such information/ investor leads that are passed on otherwise this whole exercise may be a futile effort.