One of the greatest unspoken challenges in financial communication is finding engaging visuals. Tax tends to be represented by piles of coins, savings by retro Casio calculators, and investments by small potted plants (trees if you’re lucky!). The problem is, these image analogies are hardly likely to resonate with your twenty-something employee, who uses a phone for nearly all purchases, hasn’t seen a calculator in over a decade, and kills all their plants.
Perhaps the most unyielding financial visual is that of using old people to depict all things relating to pensions. They typically involve sensible blue cardigans, a comfortable John Lewis sofa, and an irritatingly smug smile into a smartphone. You know the ones.
They may look innocent, but it’s precisely this sort of image that is dangerously capable of driving those under blue cardigan-wearing age away from taking important action regarding their pension.
Even those of retirement age are fed up with such a dowdy, uninspiring portrayal. Retirement is about spending your hard-earned money – not watching it sit in an online account!
UK pension neglect
According to AJ Bell, the value of the UK’s lost pension pots is estimated at a staggering £31 billion – an increase of £4.5 billion since 2022.
To further highlight the severity of the situation, research from Scottish Widows indicates that approximately 15.3 million people in the UK are at risk of retiring in poverty.
Millions of people are losing track of their money, failing to prioritise their pensions, and, in consequence, not saving nearly enough for retirement. There have been a host of communication mistakes, but images of smug elderly folk are at least partly to blame! They depict pensions as a boring subject to be dealt with in old age – when, in reality, we should be thinking about our long-term savings throughout our working lives.
For the UK to engage a wider proportion of employees in their pensions, there needs to be a major shift in how we communicate the importance of saving for the future.
This is why MicroFact is taking a radical new approach to imagery.
Swapping pensioners for pandas
In urgent rejection of existing image protocol, MicroFact’s employee app deploys an eclectic herd of animal characters to bring financial content to life. This original approach not only manages to engage the most reluctant employee audiences – it’s also backed by research to show real cognitive benefits to learning.
Studies cite cartoons and illustrated characters as powerful tools for helping people of all ages understand complex or abstract ideas. Their ability to simplify concepts, make learning feel less intimidating, and boost long-term retention offers huge value when conveying financial information.
Crucially for pension content, cartoons can reduce the psychological distance between now and retirement. By turning future-you into a character you can care about now, cartoons are able to bridge that emotional gap and successfully engage employees in their future finances.
At MicroFact, cartoon characters aren’t just for looks. They serve an invaluable educational purpose that allows us to deliver essential financial lessons – without the jargon, without the fear, and definitely without the cardigans.
Want to learn more about the MicroFact approach? Get in touch at contact@microfact.co.uk to arrange a demo.
