Storyboard18 | Why BFSI brands are doubling down on financial literacy campaigns

Be it fraud prevention, importance of retirement plans or understanding of markets, the BFSI (Banking, financial services and insurance) sector is banking on financial literacy campaigns to spread awareness and onboard clients especially from the millennial and Gen Z segments.

Players in the space are also roping in celebrities like Amitabh Bachchan, Sachin Tendulkar, MS Dhoni and others to be the face of various campaigns that promote financial literacy.

More than 100 campaigns with a sharp focus on financial literacy were released in 2021 and organizations are using up 50 percent-60 percent of their marketing budget on promoting financial literacy in various ways.

The Association of Mutual Funds in India (AMFI) has been working with dentsu, JWT and Mirum India for ad buying, creatives and digital initiatives since 2017. While they started with investments to the tune of Rs130 crore in 2017, in the present day the body spends close to Rs200-250 crore to create financial literacy campaigns, that’s almost 100 percent of its marketing budget on creating awareness campaigns.

“Our agenda is simple. We want to demystify mutual funds and add more people into the community. We have roped in cricket celebrities like Shreyas Iyer, Mitali Raj, Rohit Sharma, Sachin Tendulkar, MS Dhoni and many other popular faces in the last two years so that we can attract the younger generation,” NS Venkatesh, chief executive of AMFI, tells Storyboard18.

After focusing on TV, print, radio and outdoor, AMFI is now diverting resources towards digital. “We want to create campaigns for social media platforms and OTT now to create a buzz around MF and catch the attention of Gen Z investors,” Venkatesh says.

Marketing smart investment habits  

The overall spend and ad volume from the sector has also gone up in the recent past. According to latest TAM AdEx data, on digital medium alone, ad insertions grew by 30% between January and August 2021 compared to the same period last year. Turns out there were close to 240 brands from the sector advertising during the period across platforms.

The top five categories in the sector included Life Insurance, Securities/Sharebroking Organization, Mutual Funds, Corporate-Financial Institute and Housing/Construction Loans and the top five advertisers in the period were ICICI Prudential Life Insurance Company, SBI Life Insurance Company, Motilal Oswal Securities, Nippon Life India Asset Management and LIC of India.

Experts say more than 50 percent of advertising from the sector focuses on ‘education’ and not merely customer acquisition.

The momentum of financial literacy campaigns especially around handling digital wallets and UPI picked up during demonetization and hasn’t slowed down since.

“To help the next billion users access financial services online, many of our launch campaigns have been awareness initiatives first and advertisements for the product second. The industry has surely grown by leaps in a country where bank deposits and government bonds were once the height of financial literacy for the average investor,” says Anubhav Sonthalia, CEO, dentsu CXM India & Merkle Sokrati India.
The agency that works with fintech startups, insurance companies and mutual fund brands has seen a rise from users in small towns and cities as a common trend, pushing players to invest more in awareness campaigns.

Ramsai Panchpakesan, Sr Vice President and national lead, integrated media buying, Zenith says that most of the demand is coming from the non-metro markets where financial literacy is still very low.

“Financial literacy in India is only about 27 percent-30 percent only, which means we have to go a long way to educate the consumers. However, most of the growth in availing and subscribing financial products will come from the non-metro markets and that is where financial companies are focusing,” he says.

According to him, digital penetration in the non-metro markets is an enabler for promoting direct-to-consumer connect that helps in bypassing middlemen and strengthening cross-selling.

Focus on Bharat

Focus on the ‘Bharat’ market is a priority for most players marketing financial products amongst youngsters.

Stock broking company Angel One is one of the many companies concentrating on educational content to attract millennials from non-metro markets.
“We are a Fintech brand that wants to cater to the ‘digital native’ audience - GenZ and Millennials - especially from Tier-2, Tier-3 and beyond cities. We are focused on empowering first-time investors with robust financial education,” says Prabhakar Tiwari, CGO, Angel One.

“We are educating the investors about IPOs through our content library, informing them about the actionable steps and insights, and developing real-time analysis of upcoming IPOs on the fly,” Tiwari adds.

Angel One creates content in multiple formats like videos, podcasts, webinars and blogs in both Hindi and English. Videos, for instance, are explainers on topics like ‘What is ELSS and what are its advantages’, ‘5 reasons why one should choose equity over FD, gold and real estate’, ‘How and when to buy your first stock’, ‘What is an IPO and how it works’, etc. The original content created by the brand is amplified through platforms like YouTube, Instagram and Telegram. “Our aim is to create a digital first community on each of these platforms and contribute to build financial awareness among the first time investors,” says Tiwari.

Catch ‘em younger

While millennials and Gen Z are the most popular TG for the financial institutions, for new-age fintech startups like Junio and Fyp the idea of catching them young has a new definition. These brands are designing campaigns to educate young children about investments.

A brand that provides children with their own smart card for all their online and offline expenses is investing 50 percent of their marketing budget on creating educational campaigns.

“We are targeting both parents and children through our campaigns and alongside creating our own campaigns we are also promoting user-generated campaigns that come to us from our clients,” says Shankar Nath, co-founder of Junio.

Junio has content like card unboxing videos that have high engagement on digital platforms and help the company in driving growth, reach and customer acquisition, as per Nath.

The kids-focused digital pocket money startup, crossed 50K users within just a month of launch in June 2021. The company has raised a total of Rs 150 million in their seed round and plans to utilize the funds to further develop its product, strengthen the team and launch customer acquisition initiatives which include creating more campaigns for TV and digital.

The bottom-line

Even as players in the BFSI sector continue to work towards financial literacy, only 24 percent of the Indian adult population is financially literate, according to a report by the Global Financial Literacy Center. The need to push the number higher is becoming stronger with increasing cases of debt trap coming from across India.

According to an RBI Working Paper Series titled ' Persistence of Rural Credit in India', 42.9 percent of the Indian population borrow money from informal sources like commission agents and money lenders who charge high rates of interest alongside killing business for the formal sector.

As Panchpakesan puts it, the increased focus on financial literacy by the BFSI sector is an attempt to get rid of the middlemen and help investors across socio-economic stratas make informed decisions when it comes to saving, borrowing or investing.