Lillian van Eijk, responsible for participant communication within the APG program Pension of the Future, was interviewed for the APG Annual Report 2024. In the conversation, she discusses the importance of targeting. “A young person under thirty is not at all thinking about the future. They need a different perspective than someone who is 65.”
How can APG encourage more pension awareness?
“APG can’t create that, but we can facilitate it. We can support the funds in their efforts to raise awareness. I also believe that it’s our job to go to the pension fund directors with creative, impactful ideas and say: look, our studies and customer validations show that, with this information, participants become more aware of the fact that they are working today for their money “for later” too. I think that pension awareness begins with employers. They are the ones who can present a pension as a valuable employment condition by explaining to employees what percentage of their salary the employer will put in a pension scheme, and what kind of returns they can get on that amount. It would really be fantastic if employers would say, If you come and work for us, then under our collective labor agreement we will set up this pension scheme for you. This would put the emphasis on the value of the collective and solidarity.”
Is there also a need to approach the participants of individual target groups more directly?
“People under the age of thirty are not thinking about later life at all yet. They need a different perspective than someone who is 65. As well as a different way of communicating: baby-boomers use email and phone calls, twenty-somethings use chats or send voice messages. In order to reach participants, you therefore have to know a lot about their different habits. We still have a long way to go in this. I think that we can offer pension funds a lot of added value with a target-group specific approach.”
A perfectly operating system versus a perfect participant experience: which would you choose?
“I would choose the participant experience. Because if the participant's experience is perfect, then you can always work things out if something goes wrong with the system. That isn’t the case the other way around, if the system is working perfectly but has not been designed with the customer experience in mind. I really believe in the value of human contact, in whatever way you choose to manifest that. You have to combine it. Of course you want to cut costs, but first have a look at what you can gain from real-life contact. To my mind, that is exceptionally valuable.”