JWT London's HSBC UK Campaign to Launch Fintech App 'Connected Money' Stars Richard Ayoade

The latest HSBC UK campaign created by J. Walter Thompson London, will aim to inspire more confidence in millennial consumers as they navigate their busy lives and make important financial choices in a time of economic, societal, and political uncertainty. 

The app is the first of its kind from a major retail bank and will offer a variety of features including Joined Up Banking which allows you to view your accounts from different banks together in one place, and Discover, which will track all spending by logging purchases across a range of categories and retailers.

The key strategy driving the campaign, as developed by lead strategic and creative agency J. Walter Thompson London, is to encourage millennials to ‘Own the Unknown’ of their money, and bolster their confidence to face the uncertainties of the future head-on. 

The integrated campaign ‘Own The Unknown’ will run across all channels including digital, social, cinema, mobile, OOH, DOOH, press, retail, and TV. 

The campaign will be led by a 60” hero film that will continue the creative and humorous approach launched earlier this year in the new HSBC brand positioning campaign, ‘Together We Thrive’. This time, Richard Ayoade encourages us not to succumb to the negative bombardment of economic or world news, but to be optimistic through a series of challenging situations that millennial consumers might be faced with: be it relying on support from the ‘bank of mum and dad, dad and dad, or mum and mum’, to demystifying their spending habits. The film finishes with Ayoade flying into the unknown in a one-man gyrocopter.

The media approach, developed by Mindshare, flips the convention of money in media, moving from delivering advice, to providing inspiration, from sitting comfortably in finance sections to proudly appearing in everyday money moments. Launching in social and TV, the campaign also includes a number of 10” films across VOD, TV, social which showcase the apps features in real life moments, as well as high impact OOH and Digital, which use keyword and location targeting to allow contextual relevance to when money matters most for the audience. Finally, social and CRM analytics will be used throughout the digital channels of the campaign to monitor sentiment and customer journey through to the bespoke website.

Mike Watson, Creative Director at J. Walter Thompson London, said ““Creativity is a partnership between brand and agency. It’s great to be working with clients that understand, fight for, and help push brave ideas forward. Together we thrive indeed!".