7 ways to boost pension engagement

How 2023 Pension Awareness season can get employees more engaged with their savings. 

With Pension Engagement season well underway, it’s fantastic seeing industry, government, media, employers and providers pulling together. It’s definitely a team effort to get more employees to understand their pension and take steps to make the most of it.

It’s all about helping to secure people’s financial future, engaging, educating and raising awareness of pensions at every stage of someone’s life.

The challenge is that the level of awareness about pensions remains too low, with ABI figures in 2022 showing just 20% of people are confident about saving for retirement. Our own 2023 Retirement Report highlighted that one in three (35%) people are facing the reality of a retirement where they will struggle to make ends meet. 

Things may have improved over the years but there is clearly still some way to go. That’s why we’ve been involved with Pension Awareness since the very early days.  

We want to do more – not least because we’re part of the purpose-driven Lloyds Banking Group and it closely aligns to the values which underpin our business.

There are seven things that you can do to boost engagement.

1. Make pensions inclusive for everyone
The reality is that pensions need to be more inclusive. Not just those who are most confident and heading towards retirement with a potentially decent pension pot – but everyone, of every age, stage, and demographic.

Our 2023 Retirement Report highlights how women, ethnic groups, those with disabilities and the LGBTQ+ community have smaller pension pots overall and face a more challenging future. 

And with the welcome expansion of auto enrolment to younger workers and those on lower earnings on the way – it’s just passed through Parliament and been given Royal Assent  – we don’t want anyone to be left behind.

During September’s Pension Awareness Season, our virtual employer events will help to reach more people than ever, with up to 200,000 employees invited to join online and educational sessions run over 12 days. They get to ask our experts their pension questions, too.

2. Be bold and have some fun
Shaking up how we get more people engaged doesn’t mean taking things any less seriously when we make things more fun.

This year, our new Pension Mirror* has been the star of Pension Engagement Season with people using the AI-powered mirror to guess their age and compare their pension savings with those of people of a similar age.

The interactive tool is a market-leading innovation for employees. Even better, it’s fun, gets people involved and, judging by the response on social media, gets the conversation going. 

Getting people to log-in, download their pension app, and start to check their pension regularly is a great start. 

They can find out more about their pension, watch educational video content and get online support through tools and calculators.

3. Encourage digital adoption
Digital adoption is a big hook to get people more engaged. That means increasing the proportion of workplace customers who are digitally active so that they start to check-in with their pension more often, much like they do with their bank accounts. 

Using a pension app is an easy way to get more engaged and our Pension Awareness Season campaign gets that message across loud and clear.

4. Build in sustainability
Integrating environmental, social and governance (ESG) factors into investments helps to manage risks and returns to safeguard pension customers’ long-term savings as well as helping build a more sustainable world. 

Responsible investing has soared in recent years. Global challenges facing society today, like climate change, make this approach to investing even more important, particularly given the increase in numbers of people wanting a ‘greener’ pension.

5. Keep things simple
Pensions are important but they’re not always easy to understand, the language used around them can be complicated and they’re about something that’s far off in the future for most people.

We don’t need to make things more complicated using formal and complicated language and by expecting people to understand everything. Let’s take things step by step.

6. Tailored guidance for different audiences

Everyone is different and that’s why we’ve created guidance, support and educational content for those who need the basics during this year’s Pension Awareness Season – and tailored content for those who need something more advanced and already feel more confident about their pension.

7. Keep it going, all year long
Our year-round programme of multi-employer and public virtual events are another way we tackle things, one step at a time. 

These sessions cover topics such as pension essentials, nominating beneficiaries to receive pensions when you’re no longer here and understanding pension investments. So far, around 35,000 people have taken part with 50,000 expected to take part by the end of this year.

We’ve both been sitting in on some of the sessions and seeing how enthusiastic people can be. From all the questions and feedback we get, we know that employees really appreciate them – “excellent session, very educational” and “thank you! It was very helpful to understand how it all works and how I can manage my pension” were typical recent comments. 

They tell us what they want more information on too, which helps us shape future sessions, with financial wellbeing one of the hot topics we’ll be covering again later this year. 

We’re doing all this and more to keep the engagement vibe going all year long.

Find out more on our Pension Engagement content hub here and scan the QR code for the Pension Mirror, with videos, explainers, tailored content and more. Content is there for everyone to use, whether they take part in our virtual events, or not.

*Pension Mirror is best accessed via mobile, and not desktop.