Why I don’t mind that some people will say ‘BLEURGH’ to this year’s Pension Attention campaign.
Behold! After the huge hit that was Pension Attention season one (2022) – which saw grime artist Big Zuu create a pensions rap – today is the launch of the second season (2023) of the campaign.
The theme of producing something unexpected remains the same (it’s a key strategic choice, to make a ‘dull subject’ stand out). And today we’ve seen 80s/90s icon Timmy Mallett resurrect his hit Wacaday TV show – but this time using Mallett’s Mallet to help jog the nation’s memory when it comes to pensions.
But I’m sure that for a big chunk of the population, the campaign will mean absolutely nothing to them. If you were born after about 1990 you don’t have a hope of having watched Timmy’s morning antics, featuring Pinky Punky, Magic the Cockatiel and some utterly brilliant games featuring real kids and real laughs.
But for me, that’s fine because the target audience, who are most in need of engaging with their pension, will. That’s those aged 35-55 by the way. Far enough into their working lives to have built up a nest egg, but not so close to retirement that they couldn’t make significant changes to their saving behaviour.
Those that DO connect with Timmy and his Wacaday madness (and likely those people’s parents and older siblings) will REALLY feel that heavy hit of nostalgia.
Admittedly, nostalgia is an oft-utilised tool in marketing (see Hovis ads, movie franchise reboots, talking heads TV shows, I could go on) – but there’s an added rationale why the Pension Attention team chose to lean on it so strongly: We needed our audience to look back and think about where they were in days gone by to reconnect with the fact that they’ll have likely started their pension journey at an easily forgotten point in time.
There’s also psychological evidence that suggests reminiscing puts the brain into a mode that is actually more inclined to look forward. So, in connecting with our past, we really can ‘go back for our future’. Great Scott! More nostalgia utilised just there, and this time in this blog.
So before I disappear into my own meta-ramblings, I’ll return to my original point. I’m absolutely ok to hear some people being ‘bleurgh’ about Timmy and our campaign, so confident in fact, that I’m also willing to have people not understand the title of this blog.