Last year saw a 60% rise in #FinTok searches. Photo: georgeclerk via iStock
When the Bank of England interest rates changed in April this year, Andrew Bailey invited in a whole host of social media content creators, including Gabriel (That Money Guy) and Cameron (UK Personal Finance Expert). Have you heard of them?
A couple of months ago, 100 content creators were invited to 10 Downing Street for an evening with prime minister Keir Starmer and they were back in with the chancellor in October getting a pre-Budget briefing alongside other social media content creators.
Social media and content creation has come of age.
The Bank of England and the government realise the importance of social media as a channel to get their messages across. It's because there are people on social media channels who can share messages to their loyal followers, add their context and deliver messages in a familiar authentic style. It's because there are millions of people in the UK who get all their news, entertainment and financial education via social media channels.
Is the pension industry really keeping up?
What social media is and how it's used has changed dramatically over the last few years. It's difficult to get exact numbers about how many people use the different channels, and how long they spend there but the best estimates I can find are below.
It's likely that most readers will use some form of social media and some pension schemes and brands will pop up on some of the channels – but given the amount of time scheme members spend on these channels, should we be doing more?
Let's look at TikTok, within the space of seven years TikTok has grown to an estimated UK audience of 30 million users who spend around 90 minutes a day on the platform. For years it's been considered by many as just a place for trending dances and entertainment but what is actually happening on this channel is a bit different. Their audience is growing across the age groups with an average age of 30 and older cohorts growing at speed.
The top-rated financial influencers on TikTok have as many as seven million followers, and as for the people I mentioned at outset of this article – Gabriel That Money Guy has 1.3 million followers, Cameron has 430,000 followers. No pension companies come close to this on social media followership. In fact, most pension providers have no presence on TikTok and yet the numbers speak for themselves.
One in three TikTok users research personal finances on the app.
Last year saw a 60% rise in #FINTOK searches and bringing it right into our world – the word pension was searched 118 million times by users last year.
At Scottish Widows we have partnered with key influencers as well as utilised our own spokespeople. This has helped us generate over 330 million views of Scottish Widows films on TikTok and generated around 900,000 visits to our website.
@scottish_widows It's Pension Engagement Season! 📣 🎉 Our favourite time of the year is here, and our pension expert Robert wants YOU to pay your pension some attention! Search Scottish Widows to visit our new #KnowItGrowIt TikTok hub for tips to help make the most of your pension. Don't miss out – your future self will thank you! 🙌#PensionsEngagementSeason#FinancialFuture#PensionTips ♬ original sound - Scottish Widows
Robert Cochran's TikTok piece for this year's Pension Engagement Season got some 4.4 million views
I've focused on Tik Tok here as it's the newest kid on the block and it's changing the way people consume social media, but it's true that all these channels have a part to play in educating people about their pensions. There are whole communities of people talking about saving and importantly retirement. They're discussing what it's like to be retired, what are the bits the industry doesn't talk about like loneliness, purpose, life adjustments and the power of friendship, be that human or animal.
At the recent Pensions UK Annual Conference, some actual savers joined into the conference (by video) and across the entire three days just one session featured somebody who was a social media native, who started out there.
The excellent Damien Jordan from Damien Talks Money has over 340,000 followers on YouTube and some of his films have over one million views. The session he did was fantastic and if the pensions industry is serious about connecting with our savers, then we need to see a lot more of this in 2026.
Robert Cochran is workplace savings engagement and innovation specialist at Scottish Widows
You can follow Scottish Widows on TikTok here.
