The role of technology in the workplace marketing of pensions

• Published in: Journal of financial services marketing Vol. 10; no. 1; pp. 7 - 10
• Main Author: Harrison, Tina
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London Palgrave Macmillan 01-09-2005
• Subjects: Access to information; Employees; Financial services; Focus groups; Information technology; Internet; Marketing; Pension plans; Perceptions; Private sector; Public sector; Websites; Work environment; United States > US
• ISSN: 1363-0539; 1479-1846
• DOI: 10.1057/palgrave.fsm.4770169

The role of the workplace in delivering financial services to individuals is expanding. Environmental drivers include: obligatory stakeholder pension provision, increased adoption of flexible benefits packages and maturing IT infrastructure. Technology, in the form of the Internet and intranets, has facilitated the process of workplace marketing, but has also created a new set of challenges. There is a need for research that highlights how best to maximize the benefits and overcome the challenges. Set against this context, a small number of qualitative focus groups were conducted among members of both defined contribution and defined benefit pension schemes within private and public sectors. In all groups attitudes towards the Internet were broadly positive, however, the public sector groups were more critical of its espoused benefits. The small-scale research has shown that scheme member needs differ according to the nature of the scheme as well as their own interest in pensions and willingness to engage in self-service technology.