Pay is only one factor that influences the number and quality of candidates for your roles, and their loyalty.

It’s no secret that staffing is an ongoing challenge for most providers of elderly care. Market competition doesn’t only come from other care settings. Potential staff may be looking for local work in a range of sectors locally, where hourly pay is higher and the responsibilities seem less demanding. How can you compete to attract and retain quality staff for your elderly care services?

Take a targeted approach to recruitment and retention by applying marketing principles

Traditionally, elderly care providers have used their instincts to decide on good locations for their residential or in-home care operations. In recent years, some have made good use of market data to investigate and understand their potential customer base. By looking at the age and affluence of potential care clients in their catchment area, savvy operators can anticipate the level of need, design the right services and price them competitively. Today, we’re advocating the same approach, to understand staffing supply and demand.

In our work with a few forward-thinking, large-scale elderly care providers, we’ve helped them to factor in staffing availability when looking for new sites or deciding whether expand operations in an existing location. There’s a great opportunity for mid-sized operators to take advantage of the same approach.

Using local market insight and benchmarking to identify potential staff

Using demographic and location data, we can:

• Profile the demographic characteristics of ideal candidates for elderly care roles
• Contrast them to the Acorn profiles of typical users of the elderly care services
• Flag high-risk locations likely to face the biggest staffing challenges
• Highlight areas of demographic overlap, with a strong potential customer base and staffing base
• Identify the best catchment areas to recruit suitable candidates
• Analyse the likely needs and priorities of available candidates in the area

Contextual dynamics in practice: understanding local recruitment landscapes

Our current work with elderly care providers is commercially sensitive. So, we’re using an example from a different care sector with a very similar recruitment and retention challenge – children’s nurseries.

Our client told us that recruitment challenges are hampering business performance – they had had to close some sites because of a lack of staff. They needed to factor the potential to recruit into acquisition decisions. We profiled 11,000 staff members in 400 nurseries in the UK to discover their Acorn groups and identifies primary and secondary target staffing groups. We mapped nurseries in their locations, showing where the customer base and the staff base overlapped. This helped our client tailor recruitment messaging to available local staff priorities. They could plan to expand their service provision in locations where they knew they could recruit to meet demand.

Modelling the recruitment potential for new and existing locations

The approach is not only relevant for new elderly care locations and investment. By understanding the local employment landscape, you can recruit in a more targeted and effective way and find out what matters to the people you’d like to employ, so you can shape working practices and promote aspects of the role that will be most appealing.

Location and mobile app data can you help you focus recruitment in areas where there are candidates who can easily access your sites and domestic clients. Your potential staff don’t necessarily live on the doorstep but there may be nearby areas that have good transport links, where workers already tend to travel from.

Offering roles that local employees want to take

Of course, pay is a very important factor when it comes to attracting competent and committed staff. Premium elderly care operators may be able to pay staff more and offer a more luxurious workplace. But these are not the only things that influence employees. You can provide other, affordable benefits and mould your working environment and employee programmes to match what workers really value. Profiling target candidates in your local area can help you understand their priorities – from family-friendly working hours to free lunches and incentive programmes.

Beyond pay and benefits – understanding the appeal of elderly care roles

Working in elderly care is a socially responsible job. For some candidates, recognition of the value of their work can be a strong motivator. Creating better career paths and more tangible pathways for carers can make a big difference to your recruitment. Some larger elderly care operators are trying to emulate nursing pathways: clear role definition and progression can help to retain committed staff. If you understand more about the potential candidates in your area and your existing staff, you can decide whether this approach could support recruitment and retention for one or more locations.

CACI’s specialist elderly care and senior living team works with clients in the UK to help them improve operational and financial performance with access to vital insights into their customers, employees and locations. To find out more, contact us.

It is now crucial for wealth managers and financial service firms to better their consumer understanding. They can do so by ensuring they are well-versed in the entire consumer lifecycle and journey, understand optimal communication techniques required for effective customer marketing, collect enriching customer-centric data to tailor marketing and distribution effectively, and establish innovative ways of measuring these areas to remain compliant.

Access to insightful demographics on the lifestyles, attitudes and behaviours of investors within the market can help drive improved distribution performance, revenue growth and increased client engagement. This crucial investment market knowledge can be provided by CACI.

How does CACI support a firm’s wealth management customer journey?

Through a detailed understanding of current investor behaviour needs and growth opportunities, CACI can support businesses by quantifying acquisition opportunities across regions to inform effective growth and investor engagement strategies.  

Once businesses have been equipped with the appropriate datasets to target high net worth individuals (HNWI), CACI can support the optimisation of marketing performance across channels and help businesses improve their distribution performance through digital, direct and intermediated channels to drive improved marketing return on investment, increased customer acquisition and better investment retention performance.

CACI offer a range of support for wealth managers and firms to meet customers’ needs while ensuring compliancy, including:  

• Support in better understanding existing investors. 
• Understanding the market and identifying opportunities, particularly in identifying how and where to acquire HNWI.  
• Determining where potential and current customers are located, as well as their value. 
• Receiving demographic data and behavioural insights on investors to better understand the customer landscape. 
• Demonstrating compliance with Consumer Duty, with meeting customers’ needs remaining at the heart of what CACI do. 

How CACI use data science & analytics to support the wealth management customer journey

CACI’s data science & analytics services have three primary capacities to support the enhancement of the customer journey:

1. Using pre-existing information on younger investors in wealth managers and firms’ portfolios to build bespoke datasets. CACI’s multi-sector knowledge and access to unique lifestyle datasets enables the building of this bespoke consumer data insight, providing wealth managers and firms with a detailed picture of the opinions, preferences and spending potential of HNWI.
2. Modelling prospects for HNWI based on demographics.
3. Assessing firms’ historic data to determine how HNWI already in their portfolio achieved this position by tracking their movements and identifying signals and triggers, to enable modelling of future investors. 

CACI’s wealth management customer journey support: real-time examples

How CACI’s Fresco solution supported one business’ customer acquisition & marketing strategy

CACI’s Fresco solution was employed at one business to establish a granular understanding of existing investors. This allowed for the development of a targeting propensity score, which enabled the pinpointing of potential investors that would be most likely to join the business. CACI then identified and mapped opportunities across the UK, considering regional differences and high value areas to target. Detailed insight into prospects supported the development of a consistent marketing targeting strategy within the business, which was also rolled out across traditional and social media.  

Results:

• Development of a targeted audience strategy focusing on high propensity and high value audiences.  
• Reduction in digital marketing spend.
• Increase in digital marketing ROI (return on investment).  

How investor segmentation, personas & geographic data application transformed a business

CACI developed investor segmentation, detailed personas and geographic counts to support a market sizing initiative requested by one client.

The resulting data uncovered hundreds of variables at an individual level and provided rich insight into a range of traits and characteristics. This not only supported the business’ understanding of its current customers, but of the wider UK investment market. CACI developed personas to help the business gauge an in-depth view into consumer behaviour, insight into the market and the potential reach for key segments. Finally, geographic mapping helped the business understand acquisition and growth potential across catchments and regions, and cross-sell models were developed to support the immediate activation of distribution and marketing activity.

Results: 

• The business experienced steady and sustainable growth in its acquisition, retention and reactivation.  
• Increased investment values were received from both new and existing investors.  
• The business was equipped with actionable insights to help inform ongoing and future marketing and office location strategies. 

Throughout this blog series for the wealth management industry, we break down the opportunities for businesses to attract and retain high-net-worth individuals. Continue reading at the links below:

Blog 1 – Four barriers wealth managers face when attracting & retaining customers

Blog 2 – How to identify, attract & retain high net worth individuals

Blog 3 – Three reasons why wealth & asset managers need young investors

Whitepaper – Acquiring new high net worth clients – What wealth managers need to know

To find out more about how CACI can support your wealth management customer journey, contact our team of data experts today.

While wealth and asset managers may have developed a sophisticated and loyal base of investors, it is no secret that their client base is ageing and shifting. There have been noticeable changes in both the types of customers and their behaviours, whereby moving away from traditional investment styles and seeking out alternative areas of wealth to gain market share have become commonplace.

So, why would wealth and asset management firms benefit from having younger investors in their client base?

Their trajectory to wealth has high earning potential for wealth management businesses

Reaching the broader and untapped market of high-earning young investors has become critical for wealth and asset managers to continue to be successful. Supporting potential investors who are en route to wealth inheritance, who may find themselves in a position to sell off a thriving business in the near or distant future, or whose career path suggests high earning potential, are all inviting factors to drive wealth and asset management firms to acquire younger clients.

According to the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), a High Net Worth Individual (HNWI) is someone who either earns more than £300,000 per annum or has net assets of more than £3,000,000. Firms with a client base that is more likely to pass down their wealth generationally are left to wonder the amount that might one day be re-invested into the firm, while young investors are more likely to distribute their wealth differently as a result of their current life stage and emerging alternatives, such as Crypto currencies. While the average new and younger potential investor may, for example, only bring ~£100k in assets to the table, potential exists for this investor to be on the trajectory towards becoming a high-net-worth individual.

Their financial industry knowledge is superior

They are not afraid to take their services digital

The investor arena has increasingly filled with entry-level investors who have lofty expectations for customer service, especially with digital services. They are aware of the capabilities of self-sufficient online investing; therefore, they expect the same level of speed and ease of use in all their financial affairs.

How can wealth management businesses identify and secure young investors?

Throughout this blog series for the wealth management industry, we break down the opportunities for businesses to attract and retain high-net-worth individuals. Continue reading at the links below:

Blog 1 – Four barriers wealth managers face when attracting & retaining customers

Blog 2 – How to identify, attract & retain high net worth individuals

Blog 4 – How CACI supports the wealth management customer journey

Whitepaper – Acquiring new high net worth clients – What wealth managers need to know

Is your firm looking to attract younger investors? Get in touch with us by clicking the link below to find out how you can achieve this.

The distinction between attracting and retaining high-net-worth individuals (HNWI) within the existing investment landscape can feel like a blurred line for many wealth and asset management firms.

With new rules released by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) in 2022, which demanded increased consumer protection for financial services consumers, it is now more important than ever for firms to leverage data to improve customer experiences and outcomes.

As a result, firms may now be experiencing the impact of lacking the necessary customer-centric data to effectively and compliantly deliver positive experiences and outcomes. Understanding the steps that must be taken to ensure that wealth management firms are digitally safeguarded, while adopting customer-first practices and identifying the HNWI they would like to attract, will be critical.

How do wealth & asset management businesses know who to attract?

It is through enhancing customer data that is backed by demographic, lifestage, lifestyle and attitudinal insight that will enable wealth & asset management firms to better understand, reach, and serve customers. Without having the right data available, they will risk lacking an integral understanding of who to attract.

Wealth products were historically sold by independent advisors who knew the local area and could identify the ultra-wealthy with ease, including where they were likely to be, often by word-of-mouth. This is no longer the business model for many wealth management firms looking to identify potential business at scale and deliver direct sales to new investors who expect a different type of engagement.

What major challenges do wealth & asset management businesses face in attracting & retaining high net worth individuals?

Competition for investment

The everchanging investment landscape has caused wealth and asset management firms to re-evaluate existing investor experience approaches. To keep up with the changes in client demands, firms that lack integrated insight and digital engagement capabilities will find themselves at a disadvantage against competitors, and unable to provide the tailored experiences investors now expect.

Cost of living

With no definitive end in sight for the cost of living crisis, there is increased interest in targeting affluent individuals from across sectors, many of which are mature in their data and digital capabilities. Wealth Management firms will experience increased competition and pressure for those available assets. Firms are tasked with reassessing their customers’ journey end-to-end to determine how to effectively safeguard against these unpredictable times.

What techniques should wealth & asset management businesses use to retain investors?

Effectively identifying and catering for the right customers

No two customers are the same, and firms that may have opted for a traditional approach that meets the needs of all customers will quickly realise that personalised and customised experiences for each unique customer is the best way forward. It is integral for firms to understand what their clients want and where they are seeking out financial products that meet their unique needs, to help them access the right products. This approach will allow customers to gain the most use of their tailored solution and will encourage them to remain with the firm for future support in their financial endeavours.

Utilising consolidated data to retain customers

Firms that effectively utilise consolidated data will notice long-term growth and can leverage this to outcompete their competition. Firms have client data, but without an understanding of how to enrich it, decipher it and make use of it to improve their customers’ experiences, they will not determine how to retain customers effectively. Customising solutions for clients that are built on demographic, attitudinal and behavioural insight will be paramount for this.

Acting upon customers’ short and long-term needs

Firms need to better understand the current and future needs of investors to appeal to a wider investor audience. Those that acknowledge the need for enhanced client understanding can introduce insight into their business that will drive improved customer-first experiences and outcomes.

How can CACI help?

Consumer Duty is an authoritative intention that will guarantee trust between financial institutions and consumers. Firms must innately understand their customers to adapt their products and drive messaging that effectively engages them and improves results, whilst also ensuring compliance with the directive.

CACI is uniquely positioned to support businesses through agency, consultancy, data provider and system integration capabilities, all of which work in conjunction to drive value for your business. Our services and data products work in conjunction with our strategies and values to continue to connect firms with their customers.

Throughout this blog series for the wealth management industry, we break down the opportunities for businesses to attract and retain high-net-worth individuals. Continue reading at the links below:

Blog 1 – Four barriers wealth managers face when attracting & retaining customers

Blog 3 – Three reasons why wealth & asset managers need young investors

Blog 4 – How CACI supports the wealth management customer journey

Whitepaper – Acquiring new high net worth clients – What wealth managers need to know

To find out more about how CACI can support you, contact our team of data experts today.

How do you decide when to create a loyalty programme?

All businesses will eventually face the existential question of whether they should implement a loyalty programme or not. Understanding the value in doing so is paramount— customer loyalty is a big question for a lot of brands, and few know where to begin to devise a promising loyalty scheme, with many brands lacking an understanding of the potential return on investment. It is also integral for brands to have a business case prepared prior to formulating the loyalty programme’s design, as this knowledge will sway the development entirely.  

Why brands might be thinking of this now

There are several factors that may prompt the creation of a loyalty programme– increasing share of wallet, encouraging customers to buy directly from a brand versus through a third-party retailer, or enhancing direct customer relationships to drive repeat purchase behaviours. No matter what the driving forces, businesses have become increasingly aware of the impact that customer insight has on informing an effective loyalty programme and the potential cost and risk of not introducing one into your own business.

What risks are associated with creating a loyalty programme?

Improperly planned and executed loyalty programmes can result in hefty costs for businesses, plummeting bottom line profit figures and an inability for revenues to bounce back.

Additional elements you must consider when implementing a loyalty programme include:  

Getting the value exchange right

If customers do not understand the point or see the value behind your business’ programme, it will not be successful. Getting the value exchange wrong can erode your brand’s impression on customers. If the programme appears worthless as opposed to rewarding, it will fail to increase customers’ sentiment or engagement with your brand.

Getting the level of innovation right

Loyalty programmes must be innovative and uniquely tailored to a diverse customer base. Your business must meet customers’ expectations in one cohesive programme versus through multiple solutions, which demonstrates the importance of value exchange– meeting the wants of customers without sacrificing your business’ value.

Getting the loyalty mechanic right

You must be mindful of what customers are looking for from a loyalty programme, but this understanding must be backed by a data-driven approach that allows you to understand the unique selling point for your customers. There are a few approaches you can take:  

• Points-based loyalty programme: Customers are given points with every purchase they make, and when they reach a certain number of points, the points can be used towards a discount or reward.
• Subscription-based loyalty programme: Customers that sign up for subscription-based loyalty programmes will pay for their subscription upfront or in monthly or yearly instalments to receive exclusive discounts or rewards.  

A lack of access to customer-centric data and an understanding of your customers’ wishes, however, will hinder a loyalty programme’s capabilities.

What should you consider before creating a loyalty programme?

If you can answer these three questions, you can conclude whether now is the time to create a loyalty programme.

How can CACI support you with implementing a loyalty programme?

CACI’s data science capabilities and Customer Engagement consulting team can determine the actual costs that your business will face in running a successful loyalty programme and support your business through an innate understanding of loyalty across enterprises.

We do this by using our own proprietary data, data science, and expertise to understand the headroom in the market and help determine KPIs, understand which of your customers want a loyalty programme and how they want it to look to inform what potential opportunity exists. Areas that we assess to inform this include demographic richness, compliance for use, permissions, and our own products to fill any gaps around customer segmentation to determine who customers are and ask the right questions.

Our teams of data scientists and consultants will scenario plan with your business to comprehend the mechanics and experiences that must served and managed to your customer groups to build the pilot. Once this business case is understood, and a feasible pilot market has been identified, we can design a sophisticated end-to-end offering to help you deploy a successful loyalty programme.

Could your business benefit from a loyalty programme? To learn more about how CACI can help you, contact us here. 

Navigating everchanging expectations from customers, as well as new rules from the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) to ensure that increased consumer protection is in place, has led wealth managers to not only find new ways to better understand their existing clients, but innovate ways to identify and attract new high net worth individuals (HNWI). This has caused many wealth management firms to scramble to increase their digitisation and customer-first policies quickly and effectively.

The ability to define these HNWI and UHNWI can be cumbersome, especially when the HMRC, FCA and individual banks and wealth managers all use varying criteria to measure this. Wealth and asset management firms looking to grow their business through the acquisition of these individuals will have to consider the importance of overarching data and scalable transformation to do so.

While you may recognise the need to better understand your clients, legacy practices and technology can often hold you back. Currently, we have noticed four major barriers in attracting and retaining customers:

1. Sparse investor data to inform decision making

Building a high-net-worth portfolio of investors requires the right financial products. Financial and consumer data products that identify people with incomes above £100k are far and few. This makes differentiating between an investor earning £100k and an individual with a £500k annual salary complicated, and identifying and targeting high-net-worth groups a challenge.

You cannot rely on your clients’ intergenerational wealth either as, once it is passed down, it is often the case that inherited wealth will be spent or not reinvested. However, if it is reinvested, it is often done with other brands, as different investor groups have different needs. This can leave you questioning how much wealth will actually remain with your client.

2. Lack of understanding of current and future investors’ needs

Once you acquire a new HNWI investor, utilising your cross-sell and upsell capabilities to extract the most benefit from their available wealth will be crucial. The ability to understand your clients is paramount, including both present and future needs in order to establish a long-term relationship.

Consumer Duty has been introduced to make firms more accountable over the suitability of their products and services, to meet the needs of those they are sold to. You will need to review the entire investor lifecycle and journey, revisit how and what to include in your marketing strategies, and establish new ways to measure all these areas to remain compliant and trusted.

Outreach to younger target investors

Younger investors are not as likely to behave as their older counterparts. For example, they may not necessarily attend the same in-person industry events, and often need to be targeted and communicated with via digital channels or social media. They will also want to manage their assets via digital platforms to be more self-serving. This means you need to work harder to intrigue and engage with younger investor audiences.

3. Maintaining GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) compliance

By attempting to reach your target investors via additional or new channels, you must consider data protection and GDPR. Substantial penalties can come with breaches; therefore, you must ensure that any data handling is done carefully and correctly. Plus, you need to provide clarity to your audience as to where you have sourced their data from and why you are legitimately contacting them.

4. Delayed response towards technology-first approaches

The last five to 10 years have seen a significant move towards digital transformation and customer-first policies, particularly with banks and building societies. While this ongoing transformation has been relatively steady for some sectors, the wealth and asset management sector has struggled to adapt.

To appeal to investors, brands must now adopt and embrace digital practices by implementing business models that will facilitate customer-led and technology-first transformation.

How can CACI help?

CACI is already a trusted partner to leading wealth and asset management firms, supporting investor acquisition and retention through predictive analytics and data solutions.

Throughout this blog series for the wealth management industry, we break down the opportunities for businesses to attract and retain high-net-worth individuals. Continue reading at the links below:

Blog 2 – How to identify, attract & retain high net worth individuals

Blog 3 – Three reasons why wealth & asset managers need young investors

Blog 4 – How CACI supports the wealth management customer journey

Whitepaper – Acquiring new high net worth clients – What wealth managers need to know

Or to learn more about how CACI can help your firm overcome barriers in this area, explore our services or get in touch.

What is ESG and why is it relevant?

ESG (environmental, social and governance) is a set of measures through which a business can assess its impact on the world. Alongside sustainability, these are factors that affect every consumer and therefore businesses alike, increasingly influencing how we think, behave, and live our lives. ESG and sustainability are quickly becoming the criteria on which businesses succeed or fail, especially as we look further into the future.

Why do businesses need to act on ESG & sustainability fast?

The Companies Act 2006 requires large and medium-sized companies to publish an annual strategic report which must include information on ESG-related items, such as the business’ environmental impact, employee disclosures, social, community, human rights issues, and the company’s policies on each. In addition, the UK passed the net zero emissions law¹ in 2019 targeting net zero greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 2050. To reach that target, the government has pushed reporting requirements. As a result, consumers and businesses are increasingly looking to reduce any unsustainable processes and practices, which is increasingly influencing how we behave and how we live our lives.

As companies are recording their environmental impacts, individuals are becoming more aware of their own carbon footprints. In fact, 62% of the UK population² now believe that climate change is the biggest threat to civilisation. Social consciousness continues to grow as consumers make decisions on how businesses conduct themselves, and 36% of the UK³ claim that they try to only buy from companies that are seen as socially and environmentally compliant. Businesses are starting to understand that not only is acting in an ethical and sustainable manner not having a negative impact on business, but that it is a requirement to act in the positive.

So, how can CACI help businesses navigate consumer attitudes towards ESG and sustainability?

Using CACI’s ESG Score to support ESG & sustainability-driven businesses

CACI can help businesses make informed decisions to quantify and ultimately improve their carbon and social impact. The ESG Score can help businesses identify customers that are most concerned about ESG issues and support businesses in engaging with them regarding the brand’s products, prices and propositions.

CACI’s ESG Score also uncovers individual attitudes towards environmental issues, social equality and governance, and can be applied to an existing customer base to identify a business’ exposure as well as help them re-position for the future.

The resulting data helps to inform decision-making and decipher the impacts that carbon footprints have in various societal capacities and circumstances.

Carbon footprint of household + travel

A household’s carbon footprint is assessed based on household consumption – food, housing, transportation, clothing, and other personal services. It is an important contributor to greenhouse gas emissions. Leveraging the depth of our unique consumer data, CACI can assess the type of property, mode of commute, consumption behaviour and more to estimate the carbon footprint of a household. Businesses can use his information to target the right households and areas with focused messaging to help reduce global carbon emissions.

Carbon Footprint of vehicles

CACI’s route optimisation software, Pin Routes, allows businesses to create routes for visits, deliveries or collections, ultimately reducing logistics costs and improving sustainability by reducing unnecessary driving. It now also allows businesses to understand the carbon emissions or carbon footprints associated with logistics operations. This in turn can be used to make informed decisions that can help with the move towards electric vehicles.

Carbon Footprint of marketing

There is a carbon cost for all marketing activity– even an email takes up space on servers and has a sunk carbon cost. CACI quantify the carbon impact of various channels, allowing our clients to undertake a full carbon impact assessment on all of their marketing activity and identify optimum channel mix to best balance campaign efficacy with carbon impact.

Social Impact Assessment

The provision of services across the UK is not equal, with some areas having much better access to civil services (e.g. healthcare, education or leisure centres) than others. CACI has quantified the accessibility to these services at postcode level and has identified areas that require additional support. The goal of impact assessment is to bring about a more ecologically, socio culturally and economically sustainable and equitable environment. By improving an area’s social provision, businesses can promote community development and empowerment, social cohesion, build capacity, and develop social capital (social networks and trust).

To learn more about how CACI can help your business improve its carbon and social impact, contact us today.

Sources:

1. UK becomes first major economy to pass net zero emissions law
2. Three-quarters of adults in Great Britain worry about climate change
3. UK consumers embracing more sustainable behaviour

How does a challenging economy affect consumer choices and priorities that shape the UK market for elderly care?

It’s no surprise that the cost of living squeeze is having an impact on elderly care operators. Private residential and domestic care cost money: consumers are looking for ways to economise. Older people want and need comfort and care as much as ever, but they and their families are tightening their belts. Inevitably, they’re considering the cost of different care settings and options.

What does this mean for residential and domiciliary care providers? It’s early days, but as for every other consumer sector, you need to be prepared for the market to change. A proactive approach to understanding current and future customers and modelling potential demand in your locations can uncover opportunities to maintain occupancy and optimise your services to match evolving priorities and needs.

If you don’t have a crystal ball to hand, that may sound like a tall order. But knowing and anticipating market demand in your locations doesn’t depend on magic or guesswork. Consumer and location data together provide reliable evidence that can help you identify ways to stay relevant, accessible and financially stable.

Not all groups are impacted to the same extent by the rising costs of living. The majority of Acorn Groups still have a sizeable disposable income despite the recent 5% average fall.

Source: CACI Paycheck Disposable Income 2022 v2

Despite the bleak headlines, the economic impact varies considerably for different household types and in different areas. Many older consumers still have savings, disposable income or assets that allow them to choose the care they want. If you can understand the profile of your current and future customers in detail, it’s easier to identify and reach out to local prospects.

Location intelligence data is a well-established source of insight for care home operators and domestic care providers that are considering expansion or new sites. Mapping the age and affluence of the local population in a potential catchment helps to indicate where there’s likely demand for elderly care services.

But alongside age and income, there’s a lot of more subtle data that can help you market your existing services, confirm or reshape your propositions, benchmark your pricing and adjust the range and type of services you offer. This type of insight is extremely useful in a fast-changing market.

CACI data insights can answer crucial questions about your customers and market:

• What are the characteristics of your local and target customers? Acorn profiling groups UK consumers by affluence, life stage and priorities
• What are your current and potential customers thinking, feeling and intending to do differently Quarterly Consumer insight surveys of the UK population
• How has customer spending on different outgoings changed? Transactional spending data shows the split of spend with different brands and operators
• Whose disposable income is affected? Postcode model of income in different locations, showing how it’s being spent.
• What’s around the corner? Dynamic modelling forecasts what could happen to consumer spending if inflation, fuel and other costs rise in a range of different ways

CACI’s current disposable income model reflects the changes we’ve observed in the last few months. Although all households are affected by rising costs, the majority of our Acorn consumer profile groups still have a significant disposable income. It’s groups like Student Life and City Sophisticates that have seen the largest decline, driven by property costs.

There has been major growth in spend on private healthcare, with a wide range of demographics prioritising health over other non-essential spending.

Source: CACI Transactional Spend, June 2022

For elderly care operators, it’s encouraging to note that Comfortable Seniors, Countryside Communities and Successful Suburbs, who are likely to form far more of the target market, have some of the highest levels of disposable income, reflecting smaller or non-existent mortgages, good pensions and comfortable savings accrued over previous years.

Spending on private healthcare has increased in the past year. The Covid-19 pandemic and concerns about NHS waiting lists are driving this change in priorities for households across most Acorn groups. Despite rising essential costs, many consumers now regard healthcare expenditure as a necessity, not a luxury. This could have a positive impact on perceptions of value in elderly care.

These are just the headlines from our latest national data. Every elderly care provider has a different operating model and works in unique locations. CACI’s health and social care team can select data and build customised reports that directly reflect the opportunities and changes happening in your catchment areas today and tomorrow. For mid-sized operators, it’s vital decision-making information to inform strategy and tactical decisions that will help your business compete and thrive in a challenging economy.

We can help you:

• Continuously analyse, monitor and adapt – stay ahead of policy and new competitors when finding new customers and recruits
• Tailor marketing engagement and recruitment key messages to reflect the requirements of local potential pools of customers and staff
• Understand your staff and customer base and how its segments are impacted by different cost of living challenges, to identify risk and opportunity
• Tailor your offer to changing consumer and staff requirements

CACI’s specialist elderly care and senior living team work with clients in the UK and internationally to help them improve operational and financial performance with access to vital insights into their customers, employees and locations.

To find out more, contact us.

Over the last three years, we have seen a more significant shift in consumer habits than we could have imagined. Currently challenged by the rising cost of living and an economy in recession, the post-pandemic spending bubble was cut much shorter than initially anticipated by economists.

Like everyone in January, CACI reflected on the last few years, and as part of this, we revisited predictions that we made during the height of the Covid-19 pandemic. Consumer behaviour changed significantly in the space of several days, triggered by widespread temporary store closures during the lockdowns. Some stores were never able to reopen; whilst online platforms boomed, in light of these significant behavioural shifts, CACI rebuilt predictions to reflect this new normal.

How close were CACI’s consumer online spending predictions to actual results?

Mirroring our spend predictions, a phrase we maintained at CACI at the time was that “online spend jumped forwards five years in one month”. What we have come to realise was that three years on, these spend predictions, shown in the below chart, highlighting a return to in-store, were very close to the true picture.

How can CACI track consumer online spend behaviour?

CACI can unpick these new trends in spend behaviour using our new and exciting tool kit of Spend Dimensions and Brand Dimensions, which tracks over 200 shopping centres and 300 brands across the UK.

What we can see demonstrated in the above chart is a post-pandemic slump in online spend as a proportion of total spend. In 2023, online spend falls to 38%, before gradually rising again in the preceding years.

Whilst the current split in online and offline engagement provides us with an overall national average, it is important not to expect all shoppers to follow suit. We have seen asset type, product category, brand, region and demographics all play a big part in the extent to which a shopper might engage online.

Who is most likely to shop online?

Demographically, the split between those engaging in-store and online has become less distinct, highlighting the closing of the digital gap between young and old, with the difference between online market share across all groups dropping from 10% to 5% over the last year.

However, the big picture doesn’t change. Key online shoppers continue to be younger shoppers across the affluence spectrum as well as more affluent shoppers, likely driven by greater access to e-commerce platforms and the ability to afford delivery costs.

How does this vary by product category?

The recent shift back towards in-store engagement isn’t clear-cut and does vary by product category. CACI expectations were that the drivers of the overall return to the store would be clothing and footwear, household and health & wellness brands. This has been the general spend trend that we’ve been seeing across the UK since 2020.

The variation by category gets further exacerbated by the time of year. For example, comparing the months of October to December 2021 and 2022 in the chart below, there was a clear shift for household and kids’ goods spend to in-store, likely driven by the desire to experience before purchasing. Whereas, General Retail painted an interesting picture within the final quarter of 2022. Both in 2020 and 2021, with Black Friday and Cyber Monday taking place in November, Christmas hit online earlier than in-store, boosting online’s share of the market temporarily. In December, our Christmas survey reiterated this sentiment, with over half of those shopping online citing a main drive of this being concern with the rising cost of living and saving money, whereas over half of those shopping in-store did so for the experience. The experience-focused, in-store shoppers drove the resurgence year-on-year of in-store spend in December.

What does the return to in-store mean for retailers?

Across the 300 brands we tracked, many pure online brands are experiencing a decline in market share, in-store brands have typically performed well, and those blended brands have seen a shift towards a greater in-store market share. The power of the store can be seen through brands such as Decathlon, Nespresso, Build-A-Bear and Denby, who have all shifted to greater reliance on the store over the last quarter. In comparison, online disrupter brands such as Vinted and Shein which thrived through the year began to see a drop off.

What does the future of consumer online spending behaviours look like?

Whilst 2022 did represent a return to bricks and mortar, we are still at least a year ahead of where we would have been if the pandemic hadn’t happened. We expect to see continued growth in both on and offline retail spend, although proportionally online spend will increase.

However, it is undoubtedly true that we are currently, and will continue to, experience unexpected macroeconomic challenges which will impact different brands and destinations in different ways. Brands can no longer rely on their name as we have seen with the casualties of too many well-known landlords and retailers. Therefore, making informed decisions through the use of CACI data will help retain a competitive advantage and stand out from the market.

To learn more about how CACI can help your brand navigate changing consumer spending habits, get in touch with us here.

“Garbage In, Garbage Out” (GIGO) is a well-known adage that holds true across various industries, including sports nutrition, education, wine making, data science, and, most notably, customer experience.

Poor-quality data can undermine confidence in reports and impede the implementation of personalisation and other data-driven initiatives.

At CACI, we are dedicated to harnessing the power of data to deliver remarkable results.

High-quality customer data is critical to this mission. Data that is accurate, consistent, and free from duplicates will enable us to optimise customer loyalty, personalisation, AI/ML, conversion optimization, and regulatory compliance.

To ensure that our data is of the highest quality, we adhere to the following criteria:

• Demographically rich: The data provides insights into the customer’s identity and lifestyle.
• Standardized: The data is consistent across systems, allowing for quick and efficient processing.
• Veracity: The data adheres to your standards for validity and consistency.
• Free of duplicates: The data is resolved at the individual level to avoid double counting and over-communication.
• Consistent identifier: The customer is identified consistently, regardless of the source.
• Predictive: The data contains variables that enable modelling and prediction of customer interests and needs.
• Compliant: The data adheres to relevant consent and permissions standards.
• Understood within the organization: The data is accessible and understandable to stakeholders.

To address these challenges, CACI has developed DataHub, a solution that solves data quality issues faced by brands. DataHub was built on the experience of working with leading brands in retail, publishing, financial services, gaming, and utilities.

It processes and enriches data in real-time using a scale on demand cloud native architecture, engineered to work with your data, wherever it is stored. For CACI clients already using Acorn, Ocean, and Fresco, DataHub provides dynamic, real-time enrichment of data, enabling real-time personalization and optimization of the digital or call center experience.

To learn more about DataHub and its flexible integration options for all use cases and enterprise architecture needs, download our short brochure or reach out to us for more information.

Let’s work towards a future where data quality is no longer a concern.

Change within the financial services sector is complex. There are multiple stakeholders, regulatory needs, and often a base of legacy data and technology to unpick.  

From our work with major brands, we know that the change is achievable and worthwhile. Investing in customer centricity will pay dividends in the long-term by reducing competitive threats, winning new customers, and ensuring retention of base customers. 

To succeed in an increasingly competitive market, financial services brands need to establish change that encompasses: 

1. A coherent data-driven strategy – where customer data is of a high quality and securely democratised to enable meaningful messaging to the individual 
2. Establishing the right business targets and success measures – moving from short-term outcomes to long-term value for the customer and the organisation 
3. A focus on your customers and the market context – understanding the needs and behaviours of both customers and prospects to better engage them 
4. Maximising data and tech ROI – having the right tools to deliver the outcomes the business needs and then sweating the technology assets to deliver long-term ROI 
5. Measure and optimise what matters – ensuring accurate reporting is fed through the business and that teams are empowered to act on those insights to optimise performance 

Our challenge to leaders within financial services is to create a vision and become an agent of change. We want to work with brands who care about their customers and are making changes to show it. Therefore, our catalogue of services is developed to do amazing things with data and connect your brand with the individual. 

At CACI, we can improve marketing ROI through detailed attribution modelling. Our customer demographics and bespoke segmentations provide a more accurate profile of customer needs, market size, and even financial vulnerability. Technical decisions around investment in AI, decisioning or identity resolution are made by defining clear use cases for technology and designing future technical architectures. 

This work led to CACI developing a framework for customer personalisation at scale. Working with leading vendors Tealium, Braze and Snowflake, we created a technology blueprint that can achieve full integration between enterprise data and the omnichannel experience. 

To find out more about the CACI Customer Personalisation Platform or to discuss issues related to customer transformation, please get in touch. 

You may also be interested in downloading this report which uncovers a surprising disconnect between what banks think and how customers feel about the customer experience, with statistics and insight gathered from 1,500 marketing leaders and 5,000 consumers. 

You can also check out the previous parts of this blog series below: 

Blog 1 – How the banking and financial services sector can lean into a changing market

Blog 2 – Creating human banking experiences through data-led marketing

Blog 3 – Three ways to stand out in a crowded insurance market

Blog 4 – Combining data and technology to deliver effective customer journeys in the financial services industry

For many banks and building societies, legacy systems are a barrier for real-time, personalised customer engagement. Migrating experience platforms to a scalable, cloud-based platform, coupled with well-engineered decisioning, will enable banks and building societies to establish trust with consumers and subsequently maintain it. 

The need for robust and reliable customer data 

Banks and building societies are bound by financial services regulations to know the identity of their customers. Proper customer identification seeks to prevent criminal behaviour such as fraud, money laundering, or tax evasion. It is also a requirement for credit checks. 

Having well-managed customer data enables lenders to identify the next best action for the customer, and create a customer strategy and journey tailored to each individual customer. 

Inbound and outbound digital channels should be the ideal place to deliver these messages. But the use of digital technology is hampered by unfit processes and operating models that are combined with unscalable technology and batch processing.  

With the right efforts to unlock the wealth of data held, the promise of real-time personalised messages that cut through the noise is very attainable for lenders. 

Covid-19: a catalyst of change 

The financial services sector responded quickly and earnestly to the challenges created by Covid-19. Payment holidays were offered, and staff were quickly relocated to home working setups to continue providing a good service. 

The catalyst of change we all lived with created new levels of trust and empathy. This needs to be maintained by showing customers that the financial institutions really do care about them as individuals, especially in the current climate.

Mass mailings that push irrelevant products or services will erode that relationship. It shows a lack of care for the customer and a view of them as being a source of revenue and profit. 

Making technology change last 

To move forward, financial services marketers need to set a vision for the type of relationship they want to have with their customers.  

This vision will determine the way that data is used, it will be at the heart of all campaigns and communications, it will alter working processes so that the organisation becomes more empathetic. 

Through a clear and uniting vision, marketing technology will really be able to prove its value. Not just in delivering a better campaign, but by shaping the very experience and interaction an individual has with a brand. It will be about two-way interaction.  

For useful input from over 200 financial services brands, 1,500 marketing leaders in the financial services industry and 5,000 financial services consumers, on how you should be evolving your customer marketing strategy to meet the needs of a changing consumer, download this recent report from CACI and Braze.  

Check out the previous parts of this blog series below: 

Blog 1 – How the banking and financial services sector can lean into a changing market

Blog 2 – Creating human banking experiences through data-led marketing

Blog 3 – Three ways to stand out in a crowded insurance market

With new guidance in the FCA’s Consumer Duty directive, the financial services industry is being asked to get to know their customer better and meet their diverse needs. In a recent report produced by Braze & CACI, providing insight for financial services brands, it was found that 42% of EMEA consumers only use one financial services brand – so how can you retain their loyalty, trust and keep them engaged? 

Technology innovation

The general insurance market has always been challenged with engagement, as the frequency of communication with its policy holders is low and concentrated at the point of policy inception, claim or renewal.  

However, building trust is still crucial in this market. 

Every insurer is now looking for new ways to harness technology for growth and competitive advantage. The use of AI and innovative tools is becoming more prevalent in the underwriting, claims and CRM process.  

Harnessing your customer data through modern decisioning tools, and leveraging third-party demographic data to build a more holistic understanding of who your customer is, enables you to interject hyper personalised communications throughout the life of the policy, via the most appropriate channels, and actively give policy holders transparency over potential changes in premium. 

Building trust  

Whilst insurance may be seen as a “necessary purchase”, the payments aren’t usually greeted with good sentiment or the feeling of value for money. 

However, the data and insights that much of this new technology generates creates the opportunity to engage policy holders more during the life of their policy.  

For example, in car insurance, the use of telematics data could be used to talk to customers regularly about how they can improve their driving whilst reducing the cost at their next renewal. It’s well understood that people feel a sense of dread when a renewal comes around, fearing a policy price increase without a clear reason. As an insurer, why not reduce this surprise and help your customers maintain or reduce their premium? 

If the data used to run the underwriting model changes, meaning that the car insurance policy may go up at renewal, it is better to let the customer know this early and explain why this has happened. This would increase trust and loyalty, reducing the likelihood that they might go to an aggregator when the renewal is due.  

Even better, utilise predictive analytics to warn customers early of changes, enabling them to make changes in behaviour to help keep premiums down. 

Understand your competition 

The insurance market is made up of large general insurers through to niche specialists. Whilst brand reputation has a role to play, the heavy use of aggregators to seek out favourable deals is commonplace.  

The opportunity is there for the more established brands to innovate and use their capability to invest in and truly leverage marketing technology and data to create a more trustworthy experience. For niche players, they can utilise their positioning to clearly communicate the benefits of their USP to customers. 

With restrictions on the use of incentives for new consumers, all insurers need to consider other important elements of their offering and communicate this throughout the experience. 

Throughout this blog series for the financial service industry, we break down the opportunities for marketers to build trust, loyalty and a superior customer experience with data and technology.

Continue reading at the links below: 

Blog 1 – How the banking and financial services sector can lean into a changing market

Blog 2 – Creating human banking experiences through data-led marketing

Report – Banking on the Customer Journey: 2022 Financial Services Insights

Our recent report, created in partnership with Braze, found that only 53% of financial services brands use advanced techniques like event-based and attribute-based personalisation when it comes to customer communications. 

Using modern customer engagement technology will help financial services brands humanise the experience with their customers – as personalising each interaction using sophisticated decisioning algorithms will make the individual feel acknowledged. Real-time customer MarTech can manage two-way dialogue with customers, engaging them with the right content at the right time.  

Great experiences start from the first contact

As the market grows ever more competitive and it becomes easier than ever to switch providers, creating the right first impression for your customers is essential.  

It’s often thought that successful customer onboarding requires the customer to share a lot of data, but with the right customer strategy, marketing technology and third-party demographic data you can create an onboarding process that’s right for your customer without asking for more than your customer is willing to provide. Registration processes should be simple, not prohibitive to engagement, and show clear reasons for data collection. Consider neo-banks such as Plum who gamify their onboarding journey and make it simple to become a customer. 

Collecting marketing consent is an often-neglected part of the sign-up process, with a series of check boxes tucked in at the end just before the terms and conditions acceptance. Improved consent processes are geared towards signing up for specific engaging content or benefits. 

Education and transparency

Even though people are visiting branches less, it is still possible to create real trust through educating customers to support their decision making via your digital channels. 

Many progressive banking and building society brands are now using interaction and behavioural data to point their customers to educational posts or feature tutorials. Brands can therefore help their customers to meet their individual goals, whether it’s to stay on budget, boost their credit scores, save for a new home, or other major life purchases. 

Teaching customers to make the most of the digital tools available to them, and explaining how to achieve their financial goals, will demonstrate care and support. Additionally, being connected with the customer’s long-term ambitions means that bank and consumer are together for the same reason. 

Humanising the experience

With Covid-19 accelerating the use of digital channels, the online experience needs to build trust by clearly acting in the customer’s best interests, like an in-branch customer service representative would. 

Humanising the experience using empathy is key to this. Creating warmth and understanding around life events, in the same way a customer service representative would, is a powerful way to build that bond with your customer.  

It’s critical that the customer journey promotes the value your brand brings by using every interaction, no matter the channel, to reinforce how each individual customer can financially better themselves. 

Throughout this blog series for the financial service industry, we are breaking down the opportunities for marketers to create a personalised customer experience, and build brand loyalty through central decisioning engines, marketing attribution models, data modelling, machine learning and AI-driven recommendations. Continue reading at the links below: 

Blog 1 – How the banking and financial services sector can lean into a changing market

Blog 3 – Three ways to stand out in a crowded insurance market

For recent insights on how your customers feel about the experience they receive from their financial services providers, and for guidance on how you can better understand and meet shifting customer expectations, download our recent report – Banking on the Customer Journey. 

The evidence is clear, Covid-19 accelerated the pace of consumers’ changing behaviours.

Our analysis on consumer attitudes towards returning to branches highlighted a 32% reduction in bank branch visits post-covid, with even the most resistant to channel shift turning to apps and websites to manage their finances.

This is against a backdrop of other changes in the UK’s financial services sector that are impacting marketer’s abilities to connect with customers and prospects.

Retaining your savvy savers

Rising interest rates mean that people are becoming incentivised to both start saving again, and to switch savings accounts again, with savvy savers searching for the best deals.

Our recent consumer insights have found that the younger demographic are still expecting to save in the next 12 months. And it is to be expected that your competitors will increase their efforts to attract your savers to their products. You need to be ready to retain them!

Buoyant lending with a shift to the suburbs

Across the UK we saw a shift from the cities to the suburbs, driven by the opportunity to work from home more regularly. A reduced commute and a chance for more space was an opportunity many felt could not be missed.

Coupled with the government provocation of the housing policy, using changes to the stamp duty tax threshold, there has been an incredibly active homebuyer market.

However, recent economic factors have driven up the interest rates available on new mortgages and to those coming to the end of their fixed deals. Consumers are therefore incentivised more than ever to find the best available deal. This becomes a potential flash point for marketers who need to develop trust with customers so that the retention battle can be won.

Insurers need to rethink incentives

New legislation from the FCA means that insurers must be willing to offer the same incentive to new and renewing customers. Past use of aggressive incentives to win new customers’ needs to adapt to regulatory challenges.

Like the other macro conditions, this requires marketers to engage in longer-term marketing journeys with potential consumers, to win them and retain them with value driven propositions.

The need to communicate with the individual

Whichever way you cut it, there’s a lot of change to contend with for the financial services marketer.

From CACI’s perspective, we see there being winners and losers in the market across banking, lending and insurance.

The winners will be those who utilise data and technology to serve customers as individuals. To maintain engaged relationships based on trust and demonstrate how the brand is taking care of the financial interests of the individual.

Throughout our new blog series for the financial service industry (starting with this blog), we will break down the opportunities for marketers to address these challenges through central decisioning engines, marketing attribution models, data modelling, machine learning and AI-driven recommendations. Continue reading at the links below: 

Blog 2 – Creating human banking experiences through data-led marketing

Blog 3 – Three ways to stand out in a crowded insurance market

For insights on consumer attitudes towards their financial services provider’s marketing and communications, download this report, created by Braze in partnership with CACI. With input from over 200 financial services brands, 1,500 marketing leaders in the financial services industry and 5,000 financial services consumers, the report uncovers a surprising disconnect between what banks think and how customers feel. It also provides guidance for brands in the financial services industry to better understand and meet shifting customer expectations.

What is the census and what is its purpose?

First launched on 10 March 1801, the UK census is a decennial questionnaire undertaken by the Office for National Statistics (ONS), National Records of Scotland (NRS) and Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency (NISRA) that asks a variety of demographic questions on age, sex, marital status, health, education, and housing. 

 The primary purpose of the UK census is to build a detailed snapshot of society at that current point in time. Helping national, regional, and local governments understand the people and households in their constituencies. This allows these government agencies to develop current policies or create new ones, as well as plan and fund services, including education, medical facilities such as doctor’s surgeries and hospitals, and transport infrastructures such as roads and new train routes. 

 The census is also used for other purposes, helping organisations and companies understand the society they interact with. This includes: 

• Academics and Education Institutions use census statistics to support research that they are working on.
• Businesses using census information to help them understand their customers more effectively, i.e., a retail chain might use census population data to help decide where to open a new store.

How often is the UK Census, and when is the data released?

The responsibility for running the UK censuses is split between ONS, NRS and NIRSA based on their geographic region. The Office for National Statistics has overall responsibility for publishing census records and statistics for the whole of the UK. 

The data from the census is typically released in phases. For instance, in the first phase for England & Wales, local authority level population and household estimates were released, in June 2022. The three census offices each have their own timetable, with outputs staggered across a period of one to two years.  

Because Scotland’s census took place a year after the rest of the UK, reference dates will differ. This will impact the comparability of UK census data, for this version. 

Due to this, the three census offices are working closely to develop UK-wide census records, which involves consideration of how best to meet the challenges around comparability, coherence, timeliness, and accessibility of the information. 

Below is an approximate timeline of the different subject releases based on the various census offices. 

CACI and the UK Census

The data from the UK census is used as input for many of CACI’s products, including Acorn, Ocean and Fresco. A wealth of companies uses these products, public sector bodies, charities, and not-for-profit organisations to help them understand their current customers, constituents, or beneficiaries more effectively, as well as market their products and services to like-minded individuals that fit the same demographic profile of their existing customers, saving them both expenditure and resource.

We also use the census as the baseline for CACI’s annual Up-to-Date Demographics release, which provides the latest estimates of key census variables (e.g. age, housing tenure, presence of children). These are modelled forward using various, more frequently updated data sources.

As the census is carried out only once every ten years, this provides an increasingly more reliable view of the population than the census data itself. Up-to-Date Demographics is available at census output area level. Consistent with this and for even more complex use cases, our annual Population and Household Estimates and Projections provide counts down to individual postcode levels and project forward for future years. 

The first results of Census 2021 were published on Tuesday, 28 June 2022. These provided estimates of the number of people and households in England and Wales at local authority level. From this data, CACI was able to provide insight into the data to help:

The Ageing Population

The ageing population shown by this census follows our own predictions very closely, so it comes as no surprise. It does however throw up two significant questions.

Firstly, what does this mean for pensions? With proportionately fewer working people to retired people, will there be a greater emphasis on private pensions to cover the state shortfall?

And secondly, what does this mean for senior living facilities? We’ve recently been pushing the message that senior living needs to be looked at more rigorously in terms of its role within the wider housing stock and that all types need to be taken seriously.

The 2021 census only serves to vindicate that, and we would encourage local authorities and senior living developers or providers to engage with the data now to understand what their existing and future residents need, to ensure we have a fit-for-purpose housing mix for an ageing population.  

Regional Growth and ‘Levelling Up’ –

It is great to see regions other than London taking the top spots in terms of population growth. It finds itself behind the East of England and South West, and in joint third place with the East Midlands, in terms of percentage increase.

More noticeable for their omission from the top of the charts are those regions further from London. Wales, the North East, and Yorkshire and The Humber are lagging behind quite significantly in terms of population growth, suggesting that the pull of living within reasonable commuting distance of London is still strong.

Salaries of course have a big role to play – the closer you are to London the higher both salary and disposable income tend to be. The growth we’re seeing in the census is more or less restricted to the southern part of England, so there is clearly a lot of work to be done with the ‘levelling up’ agenda, to entice people further away from the capital. 

New release

On Wednesday, 2 November 2022, ONS also released their Demography and Migration Data for England and Wales, their second release of Census 2021 data as part of their topic summaries.

This includes an update to population and household estimates for England and Wales, which now includes unrounded data by sex and single year of age, providing even more detail on individuals who were previously in age bands.

This meant that on Census Day, the size of the usual resident population in England and Wales was 59,597,542, which was the largest population ever recorded through a census in England and Wales. This meant that the population grew by more than 3.5 million (6.3%) since the last census in 2011 when it was 56,075,912.

It also contains information on household and resident characteristics, including household size, composition, deprivation status, and people’s marital and civil partnership status. Providing detailed insight into the makeup of the 24.8 million households across England and Wales. Such as although the number of households has increased to 24.8 million (up 6.1% from 23.4 million in 2011), the average household size in England and Wales in 2021 was 2.4 people per household, which is the same as in 2011.

Migration data is also included in this release providing further information on country of birth, passports held and year of arrival, helping us to understand internal and international population changes. For instance, of the 3.5 million (6.3%) increase in population from 2011 to 2021, 57.5% is positive net migration (the difference between those who immigrated into and emigrated out of England and Wales).

Additional Information & Resources

ONS (England and Wales) – https://www.ons.gov.uk/census

NRS (Scotland) – https://www.scotlandscensus.gov.uk/2021

NISRA (Northern Ireland) – https://www.nisra.gov.uk/statistics/census/2021-census

UK Government Census Whitepaper –https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/765089/Census2021WhitePaper.pdf

New plans from the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) for increased consumer protection for financial services users, through a “fundamental shift in industry mindset” are to be confirmed by the end of July 2022.

The proposals include a new Consumer Principle that “a firm must act to deliver good outcomes for the retail consumers of its products”.

The regulator’s Consumer Duty directive is the latest in a series of measures tackling consumer needs in the financial services and wealth management sectors.

But how do the latest rules impact wealth and asset management firms? And how can a more effective use of data help firms increase customer knowledge and drive business growth, while ensuring compliance with the Consumer Duty?

How does the Consumer Duty impact wealth management firms?

Banks and building societies have moved steadily towards digitisation and customer-first policies over the past decade, but the wealth and asset management sector hasn’t moved as quickly.

While some firms have already adopted a business model that enables customer-led and technology-enabled strategy, it is only in the past 18 months that the importance of a data-led approach to wealth management has become prominent – and many firms are still playing catch-up. The Consumer Duty may well act as a catalyst for many to speed that change along.

The FCA is worried that, currently, financial services do not always work well for consumers, who are buying products and services that are not always fit for purpose, and not continuously receiving the best customer support.

Consumer Duty creates a shift towards making firms more proactive about the suitability of their products and services, to directly meet the needs of those they are sold to.

Wealth managers, along with other financial services firms, will need to improve consumer understanding, review the entire consumer lifecycle and journey, revisit how and what to include in customer marketing, and establish new ways to measure all these areas, in order to remain compliant.

“The new duty will drive a change in culture at firms. We expect firms to step up and put consumers at the heart of what they do, and we’ll be holding senior managers accountable if they do not.” warned Sheldon Mills, Executive Director of Consumer and Competition at the FCA.

Customer marketing – who are the new prospects?

Clearly, the FCA wants firms to better understand their customers. But how do wealth and asset managers do that? What steps do they need to take to make their business fit for purpose in a digital world and comply with Consumer Duty?

Regulatory pressure provides an opportunity to capture the market – collecting data and enriching it in order to tailor distribution and marketing.

Wealth managers are seeing changes in both customer behaviours and types of customers, and are moving away from the traditional investor to hunt out wealth in other areas – as they fight for market share. Meanwhile, fintech disruptors are raising the bar with innovative offerings.

Consumer insight is key. Young investors who are creating or inheriting their own wealth are increasingly important, as the older consumer market depletes. They are joined by more entry-level investors – and both personas have very strong customer service expectations.

These younger, and often more knowledgeable, investors are the customers of the future. They know they can invest quickly and easily online and they expect the same level of speed and ease of use in all their financial dealings.

A data-driven customer experience

Firms need to better understand the current and future needs of investors, those who might have a sophisticated, historic book of customers, now need to reach a broader audience – and CACI can help firms do that.

Consumer Duty firmly indicates products need to suit their customers, and firms need to be where investors can see them in order to market more broadly. Changing expectations might include more sustainable or green investments.

Those firms that recognise the need for better customer understanding are starting to bring in people with wider customer-first experience from other industries – increasing the sector’s pool of knowledge.

It is key to firms’ long-term growth that they do more with consolidated data – because if they don’t, they can be sure their competitors will. Firms will have data on customers, but many don’t know how to make the most of it.

At CACI we can help firms:

• Understand their customers
• Understand the market and identify opportunities
• Know where potential and current customers are located, and their value

We can help brands across the wealth management, asset management and financial services space with demographic data and behavioural insights on investors.

Wealth and asset management firms looking to grow their business need to consider the importance of over- arching information and scalable transformation. Rich demographics on lifestyle, attitude and behaviours in the investment market, can empower better target distribution activity – driving revenue growth and increasing client engagement.

CACI will:

1. Provide detailed understanding of current investor behaviour needs and growth opportunities
2. Quantify the acquisition opportunity across regions to inform growth and investor engagement strategy
3. Enable optimisation of marketing performance across channels
4. Improve distribution performance through digital direct and intermediated channels
5. Demonstrate compliance with Consumer Duty to show that they are looking at, and understanding, customer needs

If you are interested in reading more, download our latest whitepaper ‘Acquiring new high net worth clients – What wealth managers need to know‘.

Or if you would like to find out more about how we can help, explore our services or get in touch.

FCA Consumer Duty

The new Consumer Duty is an important directive from the FCA to protect consumers. It recognises the need to focus on consumer outcomes and to put these outcomes at the heart and centre of the organisation.

For financial services organisations to achieve the requirements of the Consumer Duty, there is a need for change. Change will require overcoming common obstacles around data, communication plans, marketing goals and working practices.

To be in line with the Consumer Duty, firms need to know their customer, adapt their products, and use data to drive messaging.

CACI is here to help

The result is that Financial Services organisations will need to improve consumer understanding, have a complete view of the consumer lifecycle and journey, revisit the selection and messaging used in communications, and establish new means to measure.

Operational siloes, fragmented data, incomplete consumer profiles, product-oriented campaigning, and slow/linear working practices all create barriers to achieving the FCA’s directives. Our experience has been that firms may be dealing with several of these blockers at one time, requiring more holistic solutions than a traditional agency or consultancy can provide.

CACI’s unique positioning in the market as part agency, part consultancy, part data provider and part system integrator ensures that we can really drive value for your business. Our services and data products have always been there to connect firms with their customers. Some of the ways we can help:

• Enriching consumer data – Nationwide rely on CACI’s demographics and lifestyle data variables to provide deeper insights on who their customers are and the size of the market opportunity
• Segmenting and insights on consumer audiences – the Money and Pension Service have used CACI’s services to build a profile of the nation’s wealth and indebtedness
• Fixing data quality and fragmentation – working alongside their own data teams, CACI are improving the quality, latency, and reliability of the data that Bupa holds and uses in marketing
• Improved marketing and communications tools – Virgin Money have invested in market leading communication tools, CACI has designed bespoke customer journeys to leverage this new technology
• New reporting and measurement – from attribution through to complex propensity models, CACI can visualise and report on the KPIs that really matter
• Efficient operating models – through improvements in the people and process side of marketing operations, CACI can strip out 80% of the time required to launch a campaign from idea through to results. This will enable you to send more targeted campaigns to the right consumers
• Product insights – our Retail Finance Benchmarking services provide vital insights into the market for personal loans, current accounts, savings, and mortgages which supports and enables product design, proposition development, and provides an objective measurement of market performance.

The Consumer Duty is an important directive with vital intention to build trust between financial institutions and consumers. For help with your journey to compliance, please contact either Paul Sene or Cara Bramwell to find out more.

Further reading:

• Segmentation in financial services
• Challenges in achieving personalisation
• FCA guide to the new consumer duty

As the country learns to live with Covid, CACI’s data and consumer research is revealing what the new normal looks like for the nursery market.

Customer Movement is on the Rise

Let’s start with the positives.  Remember just how much more freedom we have than we did this time last year.  The contrast between the two maps based on anonymised Mobile App data are stark.  The map on the left shows movement activity levels in the last week of March 2021 relative to pre-Covid (Early March 2020) for Central London.

Source: CACI / Digital Envoy

Dark blue shading shows areas that movement levels were way down on pre-pandemic across much of London – not surprising given that restrictions were really only lifted in early April 2021 for all but essential activities (albeit including trips to nurseries).  The map on the right is the same week this year, and shows swathes of red across much of London, highlighting that activity and visits to many of these areas has returned to almost pre-Covid levels as we learn to live with life after Covid.

Despite the fact that we are seeing record numbers testing positive for the new variant there is no doubt that many are back out and getting on with their lives after a painful couple of years.

New Behaviours and Attitudes

But we have emerged into a different world.  The right-hand map shows that the recovery in movement is not universal.   There are still clear areas of blue and lighter red in office dominated parts of the city, and around the major stations of London.  The same pattern is seen in cities across our county.

Analysis of the data reveals that our city centres are only now returning to something close to what we would have called normal before the pandemic, and transport hubs are seeing visits about 25% down.  But regional towns have grown in popularity, with visits up by about 40%.  So, clearly we have changed our activities, and it looks like many of these behaviours are set to remain.

Our towns and cities are changing, and we can see it happening around us.  But it’s a complex picture.  Whilst some have speculated that we are going to witness a long-term boom in the suburbs as everyone moves out of our towns and cities – this is not the case.  Despite the jolt that Covid brought there are too many interactions at play for all the old links to be broken.

CACI’s research, carried out as restrictions were eased, revealed that many 18 to 34 year olds, many in the target age groups for nurseries, were keen to return to our towns and cities.  These included people from across the demographic spectrum with groups with very different lifestyles – from ‘City Sophisticates’ to ‘Struggling Estates’ in CACI’s Acorn classification amongst those most keen to return to urban living.

Consumers are listing eating out, entertainment and leisure activities as the top reasons for wanting to return.

In short, for many our towns and cities remain places of fun, choice and opportunity – and this hasn’t changed with the pandemic.  What we are seeing is that towns and cities are responding to this need.  At CACI we have never been so busy in supporting our leisure clients who are busy trying to extend their portfolios, filling the units vacated by retailers hit by the step change in online shopping triggered by the pandemic.  And other urban offices and former retail units are being repurposed as urban living – a clear sign that everyone is not heading for the countryside and suburbs.

For many, working patterns look like they have changed for the long-term.  Evidenced in the conversion of office space to other purposes and in the areas of blue on the map of central London in worker dominated areas.  Our research revealed that workers claim that 2 to 3 days is the optimum number of days they would like to spend in the office, and this seems to be becoming the norm for many.   But, it is important to remember that not everyone has this option, including most workers in the nursery sector.  It is very easy to think everyone can work from home easily, but affluence, age, location and job role all clearly play a part.

Source: CACI / Digital Envoy

Analysing Kantar’s TGI survey data from 2021 shows that, even in a year scattered with various work from home advice, only 25% of those surveyed said that they worked from home every day, or some days, as their ‘normal’ behaviour.

The chart, using CACI’s broad Acorn Categories to dissect responses, clearly illustrates that it is the ‘Rising Prosperity’ that are most likely to be working from home.   These are younger, well educated professionals moving up the career ladder and living in our major towns and cities.  38% of this segment claim to work from home at least some days, and 25% of this is made up of those working from home every day.  In contrast only 20 or 21% of lower paid, lower qualified segments ‘Financially Stretched’ and ‘Urban Adversity’ have the luxury of even working from home some days.

Source: CACI / Kantar

As a result of this shift workplace nurseries will no doubt continue to suffer, as many will prefer the flexibility of nurseries closer to home, in line with the shift to ‘hybrid’ working, with many neighbourhood nurseries benefiting from this change.  The number of parents requiring nursery spaces is unlikely to be impacted by the rise in home working, as many learnt during the Covid lockdowns that working from home and providing childcare don’t mix.  However, many nurseries are likely to see increasing staffing and pricing complexity with parents expecting a level of flexibility that reflects the new-found flexibility in their working hours and location.

So, despite big changes there is no evidence to suggest a need for wholesale changes in where acquisitive nursery groups should be focussing their attention.  The big urban to rural shift is not happening and indeed CACI’s research shows that even at the peak of the pandemic 10% of house moves were from villages to towns and cities.  Tracking planning applications reveals huge amounts of new dwellings under construction or being proposed in our urban areas and, whilst much of this will have been planned before the pandemic, it’s not that easy to turn a tanker.  It is simply not possible for such a shift to happen without fundamental changes in planning policy and housing stock.

SSo, in summary whilst the change in residential patterns are moderate it is the behaviours of those residents that have changed, and the following are just a few more key behaviour changes that CACI expect to remain:

• Communities are eager to stay local
  • This is good news for nurseries operating well-run community nurseries. But it is increasingly important for nurseries to engage with their wider communities and larger groups need to take care not to look like corporate outsiders
• Social governance is increasingly in the spotlight
  • With consumers expecting their suppliers to behave ethically and transparently
• Minimising waste and environmental impact is mainstream
  • All nurseries now need to ensure that they are meeting parents’ expectations here and that they are living out the values of care for the environment that the children will inherit
• Digital is critical to recruitment and engagement
  • There is no doubt that digital is here to stay – so if you are not happy with your website you can be sure that it is putting off potential customers and if you are not sharing key messages with your parents via emails and portals then you may get left behind

New Challenges and Opportunities

Unfortunately, with inflation and rising rocketing fuel prices, there is no doubt that many families are going to be facing increasingly tough decisions about where to prioritise their spending in the year ahead.  This could impact customers’ ability to afford childcare, especially if their salaries rise above the eligibility threshold for free places, but their true disposable incomes fall.

Rising fuel costs for nurseries will compound the challenges of rising wages already driven by the shortfall in staffing that so many in the sector are facing and these need to be factored into nurseries strategic plans.

Successful nurseries should take note of these consumer and market changes, play to their strengths in these areas and they will thrive.  But ignore them at their peril as the sector faces the two emerging, and partly inter-related challenges of staffing and the cost-of-living crisis.

Consumer demand for more sustainable consumer transport is high and market conditions support mainstream EV adoption. What do motor brands, consumer destinations and logistics operators need to know, to make the most of this electrifying opportunity?

In our fourth blog in a regular series focusing on environmental, social and governance (ESG), our focus is on electric vehicles – an increasingly common sight on the UK’s roads.

These days it’s not just celebs and influencers who parade their green credentials with their Prius or Tesla. More choice, better charging infrastructure, longer vehicle ranges, affordable finance and fiscal incentives are persuading more and more ordinary consumers to join the EV gang.

Scenes of panic over presumed fuel shortages in autumn 2021 put the growing number of electric vehicle (EV) owners in a strong position. Suddenly, everyone wanted one – showrooms were inundated with enquiries and prospective owners joined waiting lists for test drives and for the privilege of buying new vehicles.

It feels like we’re now at the point of mass adoption, with the 2030 ban on new fossil fuel vehicle sales less than a decade away. Manufacturers, dealerships, fleet operators, drivers and infrastructure owners are all adapting fast to the changing market – what does the future hold and how can data insight help everyone thrive?

Who’s buying EVs?

Government and industry initiatives designed to accelerate EV adoption need to understand differences in consumer opinions and propensity to buy EVs. CACI’s 2021 EV survey shows that age and affluence both influence consumer behaviour – even when they have the means to buy an EV, older consumers are less keen. They tend to be concerned about range, despite typically making shorter journeys. That insight can help to explore the inhibitors and shape messaging to overcome consumer concerns.

We also identified less known benefits that could make EVs more attractive if consumers knew about them.

That suggests there’s an opportunity to tell consumers what they could save beyond the obvious cost of refuelling.

Data and insight are invaluable to manufacturers who need to know who to target, both in the way they design new vehicles and the way they promote them. New brands have risen rapidly to take advantage of the global opportunity for more sustainable consumer travel. Few UK consumers had heard of Polestar three years ago – now their cars are a common sight and the brand is well known from TV and digital advertising.

We’ve worked with Mazda to help them tailor content and produce engaging campaigns that appeal to the best audiences for their MX-30 EV. Current, accurate consumer data and granular analytics are key to the “impressive” results Mazda has achieved.

Is the infrastructure keeping pace?

Service stations, retail operators and landlords need to understand the opportunity so they can make the business case to invest in charging points. They need to drill into consumer and market data for EV adoption and understand the impact on their core users and customers.

If these organisations can’t size the demand and provide suitable charging facilities, they risk losing customers to better equipped rival sites. As well as losing revenue, that could depreciate real estate assets. In our EV survey, 55% of respondents said they would be influenced to visit a specific location if it provided an EV charging point.

Energy providers also rely on insight into consumer patterns of EV adoption, so they can plan infrastructure and provision. We’ve recently worked with EDF Energy to help them plan for demand and promote their home charging tariffs. A series of highly targeted campaigns engaged customers who already own or were at the point of purchasing an EV, to provide timely and relevant info and offers.

Have EVs lived up to their promise for early adopters?

Our survey showed that improved range in the latest EVs has supported strong owner satisfaction. As early adopters trade in and trade up, there will be more second-hand vehicles available, allowing more consumers to adopt EVs. EV ownership will be mainstream rather than a novel talking point.

There’s an opportunity for EV brands to focus on the capabilities of the latest EVs, to create a tipping point for hesitant or sceptical prospects.

How much does sustainability really matter to purchasers?

Blanket news coverage around COP-26 has increased public awareness and concern about sustainability still further. This impetus nudges more consumers to look beyond their initial perceptions of EVs, because they want to do their bit for the environment.

More towns and cities are adopting Clean Air Zones and Ultra Low Emission Zones (ULEZ) with fees and penalties for pollution. That’s another powerful influence for vehicle owners who live in or travel to urban areas. 

Consumer concern has a knock-on effect for the brands and service providers they use. Fleet and logistics operators are responding to growing awareness of the environmental damage from diesel van pollution. Consumers aren’t turning away from home deliveries, but they do want to see more sustainable approaches. Fleet and light commercial vehicles are swelling the EV market. Motor industry body the SMMT shared a recent survey that suggests fleet operators could collectively reduce CO2 emissions by almost a third through a switch to EVs.

What’s next for EV brands and related commercial and consumer sectors?

The EV market is relatively new and very fast-growing. Consumer desire, mainstream infrastructure, government legislation and attractive savings are creating a perfect storm of opportunity for EV brands. Data about customer perceptions and needs is vital for competitive advantage.

Meanwhile, many other sectors need insight into who’s driving what and where, so they can adapt facilities and propositions to make the most of the opportunity. European and global brands and businesses must seek local data, because every market is different.

Despite entreaties to use more public transport, UK consumers love the convenience of their own private vehicles. And for many, the Covid pandemic has made cars feel like a safer option. Responsible EV messaging as well as smart product development and marketing can help take carbon emissions from private and commercial vehicles off our roads and out of city centres.

We anticipate that consumers will want more and more in terms of green accountability from brands and fleet operators – such as understanding the full carbon footprint of manufacture and delivery. They’ll evolve their opinions as their own experience expands. Keeping pace with these expectations and behaviours through reliable and up-to-date consumer insight is key to commanding market share.

If you’d like to know more about acquiring consumer data that can keep your organisation ahead of EV trends and markets in the UK and beyond, talk to our sustainability insight experts at CACI.

Want to read more from our ESG blog series?

• Climate risk disclosure is just the beginning
• Data is key for successful businesses to take decisive action on sustainability
• Technology helps reduce waste for consumers and businesses
• Responsible and sustainable practices

CACI’s ESG Score can help you identify which ESG factors are most important to your customers. Download our product sheet to find out more.

Consumer demographics insight helps brands to thrive by understanding how embedding sustainability in their policies, practices and products will influence consumer attitudes and behaviours.

In a world with an awakening environmental conscience, consumers want to know more about provenance. Company reputations will increasingly rest on ethical practices – from sourcing raw materials, reducing carbon footprint and embracing climate change agendas to employment rights and diversity and inclusion (D&I) practices. This is about the end-to-end story of how products and services are produced and brought to market. It goes beyond what goods are made of or packaged in, or how far they’ve travelled.

Sustainability is a revenue issue

Customers vote with their feet when they see organisations acting callously or making too little effort in sustainability. In most markets, they have other options if they don’t like one brand or retailer’s approach. That makes sustainability an issue for competitiveness and commercial performance as well as a matter of corporate conscience.

• 82% of UK consumers feel strongly about buying products that are ethically and sustainably sourced – it has started to matter to 24% only in the last year
• 53% of UK consumers would never buy from a brand again if it was accused of working with unethical suppliers
• 41% of UK consumers make a conscious effort to buy locally sourced or produced items online

Opentext consumer survey, 2021

We often pin the sustainability ‘trend’ on the younger generation of consumers, spearheaded by Greta Thunberg and other prominent activists and celebs. But Gen Z is just one group in a cross-generational population that’s increasingly mindful of sustainability. It’s a mainstream issue on global political agendas and in traditional and online media, both reflecting and increasing levels of concern throughout society.

Consumer action on sustainability matters in B2B just as much as in consumer purchasing, because the present and upcoming decisionmakers and stakeholders in corporates are people too. They bring their own ethics and value judgements to work with them, reflecting the concerns of their peer groups and of a wider world.

Many local and independent businesses have lately experienced an upswing, despite the constraints of the Covid pandemic. Our consumer data provides clear evidence that the many UK consumers constrained to an existence closer to home are now choosing local suppliers for goods that they might once have purchased in cities or during their work commute. There’s a feel-good factor in shopping local, on top of the sustainability benefit from both goods and customers travelling fewer miles and the positive impact of helping local employers thrive and provide fairly-paid employment in their communities.

Will consumers put their money where their mouth is?

Of course, there’s a financial tipping point in sustainable choices for many people. Customers say they want to purchase greener products and services – but how much are they prepared to pay? More sustainable sourcing, production and employment are often more expensive. And commercial organisations need to remain viable and profitable if they’re to thrive, grow and embed sustainable approaches to lead the market.

To make decisions about meaningful changes in policy and practice, businesses need more granular information about what consumers want and at what cost. It’s the only way they can be sure that doing the right thing is affordable and viable in the longer term.

Local micro-business owners tend to interact with their customers directly. It’s easy for loyal shoppers to give community businesses feedback face-to-face about what they’re doing well or badly, and how important sustainability is to them. For larger organisations with many customers and many channels of engagement, including branches or outlets and online stores, it can be harder to gauge what’s driving success… or driving customers away. Most consumers simply take their custom elsewhere if they’re unsatisfied with a brand’s approach or prices – very few raise their concerns first.

• 34% of consumers actively choose brands that have environmentally sustainable practices/values
• 28% of consumers have stopped purchasing certain brands because they had ethical or sustainability related concerns about them
• 7% of consumers have contacted a brand to raise an issue on their sustainability or ethical practices and values

Deloitte survey into consumer attitudes to environmental and sustainability issues, 2021

Consumer data is vital to help organisations understand changing patterns of consumption and to plan outlets and distribution accordingly. It can help them understand how to prioritise and communicate their sustainability policies and actions with impact and integrity. It can inform product development and marketing campaigns, helping to reduce waste in both production and budgets. Crucially, it provides evidence to support investment in sustainability-driven initiatives, helping to predict potential revenues in evolving markets.

Organisations need to review this consumer data and trends regularly, particularly within their existing catchments and among target customer segments. Carrying out customer surveys and providing easy routes to give feedback can provide valuable information about existing customer priorities. But what about prevalent and emerging attitudes among prospective customers or in potential new segments and markets? Is there a difference? Are competitor approaches finding greater favour?

Customers, employees and investors are scrutinising your sustainability

There’s no question that businesses of every size need to take heed of customers’ growing attention to sustainability, in the UK and beyond. It’s already becoming a key success factor in customer recruitment and retention, for brand reputation, in attracting investment and for employee recruitment and retention.

The gold standard is granular data that connects attitudes to sustainability with the behaviour and choices of real consumers across channels and geographic areas.

To support this agenda CACI have developed an ESG score to drill into each aspect of how important environmental, social and governance issues are to individuals, enabling companies to assess both their current and potential customer base and act accordingly.

This takes the form of a series of individual level propensity models based on market research questions about consumers attitudes towards the following:

• Social matters around community and social concerns and human capital
• Governance issues around workplace practices such as executive pay and ethics

The product contains three propensities, one for each of the individual aspects of ESG and one unified score to summarise an individual’s affiliation to all the values encompassed by ESG. These probabilities relate to how important each of these aspects are and can be provided at individual level coded or aggregated up to postcode level.

Based on this data, leading businesses can produce consistent and reliable customer insight, using the latest analytics and modelling, to help them prioritise and accelerate their sustainability programmes.

If you’d like access to market-leading insight and evidence about consumer attitudes and responses to sustainability issues, talk to the consumer data experts at CACI.

Want to read more from our ESG blog series?

• Technology helps reduce waste for consumers and businesses
• Driving smoothly into the consumer EV market
• Responsible and sustainable practices

Back at the end of November 2021, during a small window of lockdown restrictions easing, CACI held an event in London for clients and prospects. After 20 months of not being able to meet in person, it felt great to be reunited to share insights and experience. 

Given the time that has passed, we wanted to make this event memorable for all the right reasons. To do this we organised client speakers from the RAC, Laithwaites Wines and Domino’s Pizza Group. Recognising that many of you want to hear from your peers rather than us. 

“Activating data to deliver seamless customer experiences” was the title of the event we decided on. Granted it’s a mouthful to say, but we felt that the topic of activating data into the customer experience is overlooked. Often falling between the IT, data, and marketing functions. When it comes to delivering a customer experience strategy that connects across all channels and is consistent it requires all these business areas to work together. 

In this blog post I want to pick out some of the important client messages from that event. You can watch all the videos here.

Takeaway 1: Need for multi-disciplinary change teams 

Ian Ruffle and Jenny Cann spoke about the RAC’s implementation of Adobe Campaign and Snowflake. The project has been a big success for the RAC, delivering new use cases and positive benefits (including a reduction in inbound calls). 

To successfully deliver this type of change, Jenny showed how RAC and CACI formed a core decision making team across technical and marketing disciplines. This group provided clear direction for the project and united teams around a single vision for delivery. 

Watch the RAC case study

Takeaway 2: Don’t forget the creative 

Domino’s Pizza Group shared the ingredients of their journey to deliver personalised messages to every customer. Hayley Pryde of Domino’s introduced how this transformation has been delivered through good technology, having the right people, developing test & learn processes, and then selecting solid agency partners.

An added ingredient was the need for new creative assets that can be personalised in every channel. This required new imagery, a variety of copy options, and strong integration between creativity and technology. Assets needed to work in multiple channels and be relevant to the recipient. For example, if a customer always orders vegetarian options, it’s less effective to use “mighty meaty” imagery in the campaign. 

As Domino’s Pizza Group have discovered, having the best technology and processes will only get you so far if the creative assets are all the same. For this reason, they are working with CACI’s creative studio to produce a wide range of personalisable assets for performance and direct channels. 

Watch Domino’s Pizza Group talk about creative asset personalisation.

Takeaway 3: Get closer to the customer 

Through lockdown Laithwaites Wines saw a change in their customer profile. Whilst their loyal base of wine buyers continued to purchase, new customer groups came to the brand looking for great wine that could be delivered to their home.  

With a growing base of customers, Laithwaites Wines worked with CACI to understand the UK market for wine buyers. Using Laithwaites’ data, CACI’s demographics and lifestyle data, and market research we created a market segmentation that could be applied to Laithwaites’ business strategy. 

Personas and market plans were built from the segmentation, enabling the business to understand the differences in customer buying habits and needs. For each segment, core value propositions were drawn out and applied to communications. Importantly for Laithwaites Wines, the segments provided a way to calculate addressable headroom for each segment to set very specific targets for growth. 

To listen to James and Sophie talk-through Laithwaites Wines’ approach to segmentation, click here.

Will an upswing in the collective consumer conscience suppress spending? Is the force still strong with bargain hunters? We share what we’ve learned this year about your customers’ attitudes and behaviours towards physical and digital retail.

All of our inboxes are overflowing with urgent pleas from retailers to enter the seasonal frenzy of late November purchasing. But consumer champion Which? is warning shoppers to be wary of Black Friday bargains promoted by retailers online and on the high street.

How seriously should we take reported public cynicism about Black Friday? Many retailers and brands are pinning their hopes for a strong year end on UK consumers going big on November deals this year as they plan for an ultra-happy Christmas. As the Sainsbury’s ad says, “It’s been a long time coming, so let’s savour every moment of it.”

But trends for sustainability and localism could make a dent in post-Covid consumer exuberance, along with continued supply chain disruption. Impacts relating to social inequality and digital inclusion are also disquieting citizens and activists around the world.

Will oppositional social media coverage and prickling consumer consciences exert enough pressure to reverse Black Friday’s now traditional spending surge? We take a look at key trends and evidence that will influence 2021’s Black Friday outcomes for retailers and brands.

Do consumers trust the promise of Black Friday bargains?

Brands and retailers are understandably eager to cash in on consumers’ desire to get the most for their money in the run-up to Christmas. But according to Which? research released last week, up to 76% of people who bagged a Black Friday bargain in various categories in 2020 “later regretted these purchases.” Which? retail editor Ele Clark blames “the hype around the sales” for fuelling impulse buying. She raises concerns about the level of debt that some shoppers incur to fund their purchases, from home appliances and DIY kit to homeware and health and beauty.

Which? calls out retail giants including Amazon, John Lewis and ao.com for offering Black Friday prices last year that were higher than at other times before and after Black Friday.

98.5% of over 200 items scrutinised were cheaper or the same price in the six months after Black Friday 2020. The same applied to 92% in the six months before. That information could drive more suspicious shopping behaviour, with consumers taking their time to research deals carefully before hitting ‘buy’.

Sustainability is becoming a mainstream matter

The ethics of short-term promotions and pressure on consumers to make a fast decision aren’t the only controversial aspects of Black Friday.

A Leeds University research report in 2019 calculated that up to 80 per cent of Black Friday purchases and their plastic packaging would quickly end up in landfill, incineration or low-quality recycling. The comparison site money.co.uk estimated that UK Black Friday deliveries in 2020 created 429,000 metric tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions. This year’s online bonanza is expected to generate fewer home delivery emissions, as we’re not in a lockdown situation, but the 386,000 tonne estimate is still weighty.

In the aftermath of the COP26 summit, environmental concerns are becoming mainstream for more consumers. We hear that searches for “sustainable gifts” are up and more customers intend to shop mindfully. This could mean that shoppers will buy fewer gifts, purchase more locally or favour home-made or experience-based gifts that don’t generate carbon emissions through mass production or delivery.

Shorecap retail analyst Clive Black predicts that sustainability will become more and more important to shoppers, with a direct effect on Black Friday sales in coming years.

The retail backlash: taking the moral high ground

The Make Friday Green Again collective of fashion retailers is taking a stand against what it regards as unhealthy patterns of consumer consumption. Brands that don’t want to take part in Black Friday 2021 are sharing Make Friday Green Again’s messages through a communications pack that hopes to encourage consumers to purchase more sustainably and boycott Black Friday events altogether.

Beyond the fashion sector, up to 85% of independent retailers in the UK are boycotting Black Friday with some going as far as closing down their websites for the day. Others will donate profits to charity or plant trees to help the environment. It’s partly a response to the wasteful over-consumption that Black Friday is perceived to encourage, and partly as a protest against the dominance of online retailers like Amazon.

This trend is not just for small independent retailers. Marks & Spencer and Next are two flagship UK retailers who don’t take part. IKEA too is taking a deliberately different approach, offering 20% extra on their buyback scheme for pre-loved furniture. These actions should appeal to sustainability-minded consumers and could support perceptions of social and environmental responsibility for the brand.

The reality of consumer choices and affordability

Not all your customers will think and act the same way. There are conflicting trends in socially and environmentally conscious behaviours and choices. PWC found that Londoners had the largest appetite in the UK for Black Friday deals in 2019, with more than two thirds planning to spend online. They also typically spend the most. This probably reflects higher average incomes in London. PWC’s latest Consumer Insights report also found that males typically spend more than females, and are more likely to treat themselves on Black Friday 2021 rather than looking for Christmas gifts.

Successful Black Friday retailers will develop a range of targeted messages to match different consumer preferences and intentions.

Age matters too, according to a 2021 Statista report: older ‘Generation X’ and ‘baby boomers’ expect to spend the most in Black Friday (and Cyber Monday) events, while younger ‘Gen Z’ consumers are more likely to be concerned about sustainability. Opinium/IPA found that more than half of young adults intend to buy locally, upcycle or refurbish for Christmas 2021. That’s despite their strong desire for major celebrations to make up for 2020’s damp squib of a Covid Christmas.

The stance taken by Which? implies that Black Friday hype can still be persuasive enough to lure unwary shoppers into debt – it’s a bad look for retailers to appear to be targeting consumers who may struggle to repay loans or credit card bills, particularly if the implied savings are not what they seem. That points to a need for nuanced, segmented customer messaging, for a socially responsible impact.

Last-minute disappointment from scarcities and shortages

The shortage of delivery and HGV drivers and shipping delays in the global supply chain have influenced some people to start shopping earlier, reflecting their fears that availability of some consumer goods will be limited.

GlobalData reports that over 40% of consumers believe this will be an issue. This could add to the feverish pressure of limited-time Black Friday promotions and ads, giving customers the sense that it’s their last chance to get their hands on desirable Christmas gifts. Online retailers with a reputation for being trustworthy and transparent about stock and delivery times will have a greater consumer pull.

Glitches and hitches switch customers off Black Friday online

Another issue for consumer confidence is the digital experience. Research this autumn by Emarsys reveals the extent of users’ exasperation with flaky online shopping apps and websites.

46% said they would stop shopping with a retailer online altogether if their app crashes on Black Friday.

Our experience working with digital retailers bears this out: it’s high-risk to add in new functionality and offers at the last minute unless you’ve thoroughly tested them and have a robust ecommerce platform and data to build on.

Concerns about the robustness and capacity of retailer websites could drive consumers back onto the high street, where they may feel more confident about the face-to-face shopping experience. Nonetheless, John Lewis must be confident in its digital experience, expecting 70% of its Black Friday sales via online channels and just 30% in-store.

What we’ve learned… so far

Debate rages about which of the competing trends will be most influential and we look forward to seeing the commercial results for leading brands, revealing the success or otherwise of their 2021 Black Friday approach.

Our verdict for now:

• Black Friday 2021 will still engage many consumers. More and more brands will consider the sustainability implications of promotions and will do what they can to reassure customers that they’re controlling waste and carbon emissions
• Canny consumers will do their research before succumbing to email hyperbole and Black Friday countdowns
• Retailers who offer genuine value and a consistent digital and in-store customer experience will do best from the event, not just on the day but in building lasting loyalty
• Organisations who can track and review customer behaviour after the event will have valuable learnings to draw on for future promotional events and Black Fridays to come.

If you’d like to share your views on Black Friday or to talk to us about how data and tech can help your organisation deliver effective promotions and sustainable customer experiences, please get in touch.

For many of us, COVID-19 has been the most significant, and perhaps the most traumatic, experience of our lives. It has had a huge impact on us as individuals, as a society and as a workforce. While some things will return to some semblance of pre-pandemic normality, many things have changed forever and have become our ‘new normal’.

Overnight, lockdown measures forced many of us to work from home which has led to the normalisation of remote working. This more flexible way of working has allowed more time with the kids, the opportunity to walk the dog in the park at lunchtime as well as being at home when online purchases are delivered.

Living and working locally means we are spending more time at home, spending more money on our local high streets, and supporting local businesses. In CACI’s Wealth of the Nation Report analysis that focuses on the changing movement of the population across a pandemic and the impacts of wealth touch on this point.

But How Will Our Working Behaviours Change as Measures are Lifted?

As part of our assessment of the Future of our Office Space, CACI has published a ranking of the HOT 100 Work From Home (WFH) locations. This analysis has identified the top locations with the highest volume of workers likely to change their working habits and work from home more frequently as a result of Covid.

This analysis prompts us to question whether the pandemic has affected the way our work and home life co-exist?

At the height of the pandemic last year there was a lot of discussion about whether we would return to the office and, if so when and how often? What would be the impact of working remotely and how would this affect how we communicate, connect, and create? And what will our workplaces look like if our offices are virtual and we lose those social interactions?

As Lockdown Measures Are Lifted and We Are Being Asked to Return to the Workplace, What Will Be the Outcome?

CACI’s weekly COVID analysis has shown that while there is a clear desire to get back to the office, businesses must adapt to the changing worker needs. Furthermore, we have established that 2.8 is the optimum number of days a week workers would ideally like to spend in the office in the future.

So, what will people do for the remainder of the traditional 5-day working week?

While certain businesses depend on face to face and in person experiences to exist, many more can operate in a virtual environment. They have become accustomed to using video conferencing platforms which have seen a huge surge in use that is unlikely to change in a post-COVID world.

People now want to be able to split time working between home and the office meaning office-based time will focus more around collaborating and networking with colleagues.

As remote work is adopted as the ‘new normal’, many are choosing to leave big cities in favour of more local and suburban areas which have seen an increase in flexible working environments reflect our changing behaviours and needs.

Since April 2020, CACI has been producing free weekly reports that have focused on the changing movement of your customers and our communities. Amongst many of the findings to come out of this analysis we have established that money has historically been used to buy freedom of movement, and throughout the pandemic – for those who have money – it has bought people freedom to stay still.

It is very clear from the data that affluent community groups have had the choice to stay at home and make use of local amenities, while those less affluent and more disadvantaged groups have needed to travel further for personal or work purposes.

More than ever customers expect brands to speak to them, not just literally, but with content that they relate to. It’s not enough to have a phenomenal product, a killer marketing strategy and an arsenal of digital tools – if the messaging is off, it could all be for nothing. Your content is the most direct route to connecting with your audience on an individual level, so using techniques including emotion and narrative, as well as making sure the message fits the channel, is vital to maximising every valuable opportunity.

Sorry, do I know you?

The key to on-target messaging is knowing your audience, and it all starts with the data. Once you’ve collected profile data and created meaningful segments through Tealium and CACI’s consumer segmentation tool, Acorn, you will have a deeper level understanding of who you’re talking to. You can personalise content effectively, far beyond first names, using their last interaction or other details to bring a conversation to life, effectively mimicking one-on-one communication. Knowing a customer inside out means you can signal the values that align with theirs or share their vision for a better life. And the more data captured, the more sophisticated and creative the personal touch can become.

Once upon a time…

Once you have an idea of your audience, how can you effectively capture and hold their attention? Evolved over thousands of years, storytelling is the most powerful tool you can use to compel the brain. It has the ability to communicate so much, including, by using the brand as the personality at the centre of the story, who the brand is. Good storytelling uses the power of language and, where possible, causes you to pause and reflect, making it more likely to stick in the memory.

But storytelling doesn’t need words, visual narratives are equally effective and better suited to social media. Videos can prompt a stronger emotional response and are more likely to be shared, whilst imagery can solidify feel and focus. User-generated content can help tell stories whilst having the added benefit of generating trust in the brand. Storytelling in this way isn’t a hard sell. It takes the approach of content marketing, that is, nudging behaviour through being thoughtful, relevant and engaging.

Once more with feeling

Humans are fuelled by emotion – we feel first and think second. Using language that triggers emotions we are hard-wired to respond to can be very effective. Love, fear, anger and guilt are all primitive drivers of behaviour. By knowing your audience, you can speak directly to their individual joys, fears and pain points, and ultimately inspire them to take action. For example, a car’s anti-lock braking system may help you have more control whilst driving, but if you say it helps keep your family safe, it taps into a desire to protect your loved ones and is more likely to resonate.

After the turmoil of Covid, most people feel the need for connection more than ever. The global pandemic has reminded us that we all crave the very human experience of bonding.

Using emotion to cultivate a sense of belonging can establish a connection which is more impactful and longer lasting. It goes beyond selling, it’s a way of bringing authenticity to a brand’s identity and helps the reader buy into the brand values and ethos.

Mixed messages – making the message work for the channel

Increasingly consumers take different pathways to making a purchase, having different touchpoints along the way. Whilst it’s important messaging is consistent, it doesn’t have to be adhered to rigidly. With an awareness of which audience uses each channel, the message can be creatively tailored using a tool such as Spirable to have the most impact on the target audience.

For example, Instagram is more likely to be used by Millennials or Generation Z, so messaging needs to align with their interests and needs, and the tone will be more assertive and dynamic. Email marketing provides an opportunity to pique interest through weaving more narrative, focusing on messaging that resonates with the demographic, whilst push notifications can use real-time content to engage and visuals to bring a message to life.

There’s no one quick fix to creating a message that connects with your audience. But a combination of personalisation, focus on tapping into an emotion and telling a story are more likely to make your reader sit up and take notice, and make sure your message doesn’t get lost in the noise.