In the interest of starting the kids early with life skills, The Halifax is enlisting the help of young YouTube stars / ‘vloggers’, to help teach other children about basic money management.
Halifax and the Young Vloggers
What better way is there to communicate with young people than using a combination of their peers, celebrity (vloggers), and a medium that many of them use regularly? This is just what The Halifax, part of Lloyds Banking Group, has decided is a worthwhile tactic pursue, as it has selected children who are YouTube video bloggers, or vloggers, and asked them to create vlogs for 11 to 15 year-olds.
Money Matters
The YouTubers will talk about management in a language that is familiar to the target age bracket and they will offer guidance and information on savings, spending, and online safety.
The Halifax is also making videos intended for parents to help them discuss money matters with their kids.
Study
In a study by Internet Matters, it was reported that 75% of 5 to 15 year-olds use YouTube. The same study revealed that parents have a hard time talking about money with their children. With these findings, The Halifax launched its vlogging campaign.
Really?
Some commentators have pointed out that although this tactic has a feel-good factor to it (and the potential to get positive PR for Halifax), it just happens to support their online banking service launched in 2015, and aimed at young age bracket, and could be an inventive way to nurture the next generation of loyal Halifax customers.
Online Service
Designed with Childnet International and the Money Advice Service, Halifax’ online banking service offers financial education, online safety information, and mobile banking app access. While its online content has its attraction, many youngsters age 11 to 15 are not using online banking services.
Target Market Love YouTube
Based on the research of Internet Matters, an average of 26 posts a day are made by children on social networks like Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube. They also spend 15 hours a week online, but only 48% of 11 to 15 year-olds, who are account holders of Halifax, regularly use online banking services.
The Three YouTubers
The 3 young vloggers chosen to present the videos for Halifax may only be aged 14 (Ambi and Evie), and 15 (Oscar), but they’re old hands when it comes to talking about a range of topics on YouTube.
Just as Gen-Z members are early-starters who value recommendations from peers when making their own brand / product choices, Halifax may well be hoping that its teenage vloggers will deliver more and more financially educated young customers, and whole brand-loyal families. The 3 vloggers have talked about many topics from fashion to politics, and now, they will create educational videos about money management and offer tips, advice, and guidance to more than 55,000 of their subscribers.
What Does This Mean For Your Business?
Many businesses face the challenge of communicating effectively with (and selling to) young customers. Many young people spend a lot of time online, and much of that on social media. Harnessing the power of social media is now an important aspect of business communications. Finding ways to encourage young people to share social media messages (and videos) requires an understanding of the buyer behaviour of that group, a campaign that is ethical, genuinely interesting and value-adding, supports and feeds into an existing product / service, and one that can generate good PR. Clearly, The Halifax has done its homework in a campaign that could generate more, educated, loyal customers by talking to them using their own voice, and by making it easier for families to talk about money with each other. Time will tell however what the real ROI on this idea is, but for the moment it is generating some good PR for The Halifax’s young persons’ banking services.