Andrew Short questions whether the web alone is sufficient to reach an apathetic population and how social media can help boost member engagement.
A shift in focus
FriendsLife corporate pensions communications manager David Millar believes auto-enrolment will have a big impact on how schemes communicate.
“Pension scheme communication has very much focused on why people should join. Once auto-enrolment comes in, the focus in communications will change from ‘why join’ to ‘what now’.
The assumption will be that people have entered the process but to increase interest in long-term saving there must be further communication.
The industry needs to engage people with their savings – auto-enrolment doesn’t solve the problem on its own.
Just because someone has defaulted into a pension scheme and is saving, it does not mean they understand what’s going on or that they appreciate the benefits.”
This change in attitude has made many companies look at how they can integrate a number of benefits into one package to keep members engaged.
Towers Watson EMEA practice leader for communication and change management Richard Veal says:
“There is a driving need for people to review their situation once a year.
Towers Watson recommends organisations synchronise such areas as flexible benefits enrolment with the opportunity to review their pension choice once a year to create a healthy and regular habit of review.
Some organisations do not make that connection. They’ll set up a good scheme, get people in it and then just leave them to it.
In actual fact, an annual review of how much you’re saving and what your perspective is on risk is necessary in order to take proper ownership of the goal of saving.”
This bundling of benefits is called a corporate wrap or platform. David Millar explains in more detail how these can benefit employers:
“The government is saying the workplace has to be the engine for saving in the UK. In the workplace, lots of people are comfortable with the idea of saving for a pension.
Providers like FriendsLife are building corporate platforms, which allow ISAs through the workplace and other savings vehicles.
Over the course of the next year you’ll start to see not only people getting information on their scheme, but other ways of saving too, via their employer.
The communications picture will become more holistic. People will start to think less about pension communication and more about financial education. This is where it all starts.”
Corporate platforms are a great way of keeping members engaged but personalising communication can also have a great effect.
Schemes have member’s details stored electronically and this means when they do send out any information they can also make it personal.
Ferrier Pearce associate director Mike Jones believes providers should get creative with their messages. In an earlier interview with PP he said:
“There’s no reason why you can’t send members a text or email on their 40th birthday saying ‘happy birthday – do you know there are only 180 paydays until retirement?’” (PP Online, 17 Feb).
He believes this personalisation is also cheap and cost-effective because of modern digital printing and electronic messaging.
The power of social media
The real consensus in the pensions industry is the power of social media. This is a because it’s very cheap to maintain and is a very personal way of communicating with members.
It costs nothing to set up a Facebook or Linkedin group and is very easy to promote. When used in conjunction with other methods of communicating it is a very effective tool.
The challenge seems to be to motivate people to go online and talk about pensions.
Richard Veal discusses how Towers Watson has been trying to motivate members to go online with a viral video campaign.
He claims this is a way to pique people’s interest before increasing communication by other methods:
“We’re exploring the power of group think. We’re looking to embed social media rather than have it being a separate tool. We’re trying to make it part of the standard way of communicating. We had one client who had employers set up a forum about pensions as a result of having received a viral video we sent out. We’ve looked at that forum and used some of the dialogue to continue talking to members about things that matter to them'.
“So the important thing is the audience telling you what communication they want not you second guessing.
If you’re monitoring forum discussions you know you are picking up on things people care about. What we did was trigger interest with a viral advertising campaign and then, via social media, pick up on the things they’re interested in. It then informs what you focus on next.”
It is clear the advent of auto-enrolment will have a major impact on how schemes look to communicate with members in the future.
Social media looks set to play a larger role as part of an expanded online communications strategy.
However, while online functionality continues to develop, close attention must be paid to the number of people actually using the tools.
It would seem that while online communications have a role of play, other methods of communication will also need to be deployed if we are really to engage members with their pensions.
