When Annuity Ready came to Fanclub PR, it had a product people genuinely needed — an annuity comparison tool — but almost no public profile. The challenge: launch its first creative campaign in a crowded financial services market, dominated by major brands with big budgets, and establish Annuity Ready as a trusted, credible voice in the pensions conversation.
The opportunity we identified was clear. Millions of Brits, particularly those aged 45 to 70, are approaching retirement with serious gaps in their pension knowledge, and no one in the category was talking to them like a human being.We set out to change that.
Rather than a product-led campaign, we built a research-driven platform that put real people’s pension fears at its centre — moving Annuity Ready upstream from the niche term “annuity” into the everyday language of “pension”, making the brand more mentally accessible long before people are actively in-market.
We commissioned original research that exposed a stark pension literacy gap between privately and state-educated Brits, giving us a compelling, newsworthy angle that went well beyond the product category.
TV presenter and Martin Lewis Money Show regular Angellica Bell fronted the campaign, lending authority and warmth, and opening doors with mainstream media that a purely financial story could never have unlocked.
Commercial Director Sarah Lloyd was positioned as the campaign’s expert spokesperson, securing 14 broadcast appearances across 14 stations in Edition 1 alone, including multiple BBC regionalstations, and becoming a go-to voice for ongoing pensions coverage.
The campaign launched in February 2024 to immediate national traction, a double-page spread in The Sunday Times, coverage in The Sun, Daily Express, Daily Mirror, The Standard, i news and 24 regional newspapers, plus broadcast coverage on Sky News and across the BBC regional network.
Between campaign editions, targeted news generation activity kept Annuity Ready in the media conversation, tying the brand’s research data into live stories around the triple lock and state pension, and cementing Sarah Lloyd as a reactive media voice. GB News cited Sarah and the campaign in multiple follow-up articles, organically and unprompted.
The second edition launched in 2025 with an exclusive in ThisIsMoney.co.uk and the Daily Mail, generating 73 pieces of coverage, 501 radio and TV appearances across regional BBC, Sky News and the Bauer Network, and a 33.3% increase in share of voice in the first week.
“The research gave us permission to talk to people about their pension fears — on their terms, not the industry’s.”
Across all campaign editions and sustained activity, Fanclub delivered more than 363 pieces of coverage and an estimated 5.4 million media views, plus a projected reach of 263M from the 2025 sustain programme alone.
A Retirement Readiness Quiz via ScoreApp delivered a 63% conversion rate and 92% completion rate, turning earned media reach into measurable consumer engagement.
Annuity Ready entered the campaign unknown. It emerged as the authoritative public voice on pension readiness, with journalists returning to Sarah Lloyd for comment, a Reddit community forming organically, 11 organic data citations in the 2025 sustain phase, and website traffic up 412% in launch week.
Domain authority increased by 2 points, driven by organic backlinks from The Sunday Times, GB News and Manchester Evening News.
