At the Estonia’s most prestigious marketing and public relations awards gala last Friday, Invest Estonia’s PR and marketing efforts in attracting foreign investments to Estonia and increasing Estonia’s visibility in the global media outlets were recognised by the Estonian Marketing Association with the golden prize in public sector’s communication category for the Digitally Wild press trip.
“Only Estonians were crazy enough to plan a visit to Estonia for international journalists regardless of the uncertainty of the end of pandemic travel restrictions,” says one of the press trip’s initiators Kata Varblane, Invest Estonia’s Deputy Director of Marketing and International Relations. “But thinking big and bold, and being agile if needed, is the way we like to do things.”
The Digitally Wild press trip, held in August 2021, brought 11 foreign journalists to Estonia, and created 17 media articles worldwide, including in The Financial Times, Bloomberg, Forbes, Sifted, and Tech.eu. During the three-days visit, 11 sites were visited in Estonia. Estonia’s president (2016-2021) Kersti Kaljulaid, prime minister Kaja Kallas, minister of entrepreneurship and information technology Andres Sutt and 30 awesome entrepreneurs based in Estonia but operating worldwide met the journalists face-to-face.
Everything is possible in Estonia
“In Estonia nothing is impossible,” says Kata Varblane. “If you need to kickstart the day by having coffee with the President, getting a tour from the Prime Minister at noon, and chatting with the Minister of Entrepreneurship and IT during dinner, plus meeting soon-to-be-unicorn startup founders in between – it all can be organised. It’s only natural that we have no hierarchies and can easily avoid unnecessary bureaucracy at every step,” she explains.
“If you add breath-taking food and positively shocking sauna experiences, a surprise meeting with one of the world’s greatest composers Arvo Pärt in the middle of a calming pine forest, a ride on a self-driving bus and a dive into the space of cyber security – this is a peek into ‘digitally wild’ Estonia experience,” Varblane describes.
The press trip to Estonia was organised by the PR-agency Meta Advisory on behalf of Invest Estonia and our splendid sister agencies e-Estonia, Trade with Estonia,e-Residency, Brand Estonia, and Visit Estonia.
In addition to the press trip, Invest Estonia’s investment promotion event Unicorn59 2021 produced by event promotion agency Jolos was shortlisted as an outstanding promotion event.
Work in Estonia wins two awards
Work in Estonia, a part of the Estonian Investment Agency won the Silver Egg and the Bronze Egg for the campaign “Just log in”, aiming to recruit IT talent to Estonia in the “digital campaign” and “brand’s social media communication” categories.
The Estonia’s IT sector is constantly looking for new talent and nothing can affect it – not even the global lockdown of 2021. Through sincerity and self-irony, Work in Estonia was rebranded to Work in e-Estonia. And the most advanced digital country Estonia was transformed to be the world’s best home office. As a result of the campaign, 27,000 foreign IT talents applied for a job in Estonia.
Standing out from the crowd
To gain attention and win new opportunities from serious investors, today’s investment promotion agencies must find a way to stand out from the crowd. Invest Estonia is repeatedly setting the standard for other investment promotion agencies in the region to follow. With innovative and creative solutions, coupled with bold and strategic decisions, Invest Estonia has gained recognition, won several prestigious awards and received international attention.
In 2022, Invest Estonia’s automation solutions were listed among UNESCO’s global top 100 AI projects.
In both 2020 and 2021, Invest Estonia has come out in top in Emerging Europe’s annual investment promotion report.
In 2020, Invest Estonia has received the United Nations Investment Promotion Award for Excellence in the Response to COVID-19 crisis and also awarded as the best content marketer of the year in Estonia.
In 2018 – 2020, Invest Estonia received Site Selection Magazine’s Top Investment Agency of the region award three times.
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