Pay Your Pension Some Attention
In a nation where millions of people ignore their workplace pensions, the Association of British Insurers (ABI) and Pensions and Lifetime Savings Association (PLSA) faced a critical challenge: how do you inspire 35-55 year olds to engage with their pension planning when the topic feels overwhelming, boring, or simply irrelevant to their daily lives?
The ambitious goal was to create a memorable and impactful Pension Attention campaign, with a particular focus on “playing catch up” with female audiences who had been underrepresented in previous campaigns.
The Solution
The Face Forward campaign launched with reality TV star Gemma Collins as its face, transforming pension engagement from a chore into an accessible conversation. Using the tagline “For the future you,” the campaign employed a multi-channel approach spanning PR, paid media, social media, out-of-home advertising, and a dedicated campaign website.
The creative featured Gemma with her signature megaphone, delivering the message with relatability that cut through the noise of financial services marketing. The campaign was strategically timed around key moments including Pension Awareness Week, National Pension Tracing Day, and Talk Money Week to maximise impact throughout the pension engagement season.
Outstanding Results
The Face Forward campaign delivered remarkable results across all key metrics:
- 198.7 million paid media impressions
- 131,768 link clicks driving traffic to the campaign website
- 498,249 video views across YouTube advertising
- 2.43 average frequency, ensuring strong message recall
Programmatic digital display campaign proved the most effective channel, generating:
- 149.7 million impressions with exceptional efficiency
- 94,267 link clicks to the website
- 28.4 million people reached with a 4.5 average frequency
The campaign website became a hub of activity:
- 116,766 unique visitors
- 124,250 total site visits
- 138,961 total pageviews
- 71% of outbound clicks went to the pension tracing tool, demonstrating clear intent to take action
Impact surveys revealed that 87% of those who recalled seeing the campaign took concrete action, from checking their pension details to increasing contributions. Most significantly, the campaign inspired an estimated 3.9 million employees to pay their pension some attention – up from 3.5 million in the previous year.
The gender strategy proved particularly successful, with female viewers in the 35-55 target demographic representing 52% of YouTube viewers, and women showing more cost-effective engagement across paid social channels.
Face Forward demonstrated that with the right celebrity partnership, creative execution, and multi-channel strategy, even the most challenging financial topics can drive mass engagement and real behavioral change. The campaign’s success has established a new benchmark for pension engagement communications, proving that when you make pensions accessible and actionable, people will respond.
Campaign delivered by MessageSpace for ABI and PLSA in partnership with Third City.