What you need to know:

• Unisuper CMO Dani Murrie says the fund’s first brand campaign earlier this year, ‘Look Forward, Think Great’, has increased brand awareness fivefold. But it is still outside the top 10 super funds.
• Unisuper is the sixth-largest super fund by size. It has $108bn funds under management and, after a merger next month, it will have more than 620,000 members.
• Her focus is on building brand and growing and protecting the fund’s reputation. She’s investing in digital experience, and pushed a new app through within six months earlier this year.

No other industry has a legal requirement for its advertising and marketing decisions to be in the “best financial interests” of customers – but the superannuation sector does. It is the challenge on top of the worsening economic conditions that Dani Murrie, relatively new Chief Marketing and Growth Officer at Unisuper, is working in to grow the super fund's market share.

Up until mid-last year, Unisuper was a closed industry fund for teachers and higher education employees. Now the $108 billion fund is open to anyone, about to merge with Australian Catholic Superannuation, and is perched to become the fifth largest superannuation fund in the country. After the merger, it will have more than 620,000 members.

“To win in a world of choice, of superannuation choice, we do want to build that Unisuper brand and make it really strong,” Murrie said.

It’s a steep hill to climb. Unisuper launched its first brand campaign in February this year, via creative shop Hive Collective, with the platform ‘Look Forward, Think Great’. It refreshed the campaign in August. But despite a fivefold increase in brand awareness since launch – off an admittedly low base, Murrie noted – the fund is still outside the top 10 superannuation firms on brand awareness metrics. “We haven't done much broad brush, above the line marketing or advertising because we've been a closed fund,” Murrie said. “We don't want to be the biggest – we do want to be the best, though… And ultimately the role that I've taken on is tasked with protecting and enhancing the brand's reputation story as the fund is now open to all Australians.”

Superannuation is a sector that favours consolidation and scale. At the top sits Australian Super, a behemoth with $258 billion in assets from its 2.87 million members. Second is Australian Retirement Trust, a new, $240 billion-ish fund former by the merger of QSuper and Sunsuper that has more than 2 million members. ART is, incidentally, currently pitching its $15 million media and $5 million creative accounts.

Murrie says her role is to promote four key features of Unisuper in its brand push: A 40-year history of investment returns, an in-house investment team, a financial advice offer, and a new ESG commitment.

Digital key

Murrie takes charge of the fund’s digital product, which included creating an app for customers within six months at the start of 2022. “That’s one area I would say we were late to market,” she said. Telstra’s former CMO turned digital exec Jeremy Nicholas said 80 per cent of customer sales and service interactions happened online. Brands are increasingly defined by their customer experience, he noted, and “increasingly that’s a digital experience”.

Murrie agreed. Since launching the Unisuper app in July, 33 per cent of account logins happen in the app – in just five months. “We haven't done any broad marketing on that. That's really people finding out about it through our direct means,” Murrie said. Likewise, 80 per cent of members are registered for the fund’s online account system. “Where are we focused from that investments perspective? It definitely is in the digital space,” she said.

Members best financial interests

A year ago, the Your Super, Your Future legislation came into effect, meaning superannuation funds had to justify every dollar spent as being in the “best financial interests” of members. The media plan, the new app, the marketing – it all must be justified with arguably more rigour than in other sectors.

“Any of the marketing work that we do is very specific and targeted right down to our media buying plan,” Murrie said. “Everything must be tracked to be able to justify the hurdles of the best financial interest duty. What I say is marketing attracts new members, and that in turn provides scale, and that in turn means you can reap the rewards of scale. … it's a scale argument.”

Unisuper has invested heavily in “laser-like” digital marketing, search engine optimisation and search engine marketing, as well as podcasts, webcasts and seminars.

“It all comes to understanding who your target audience is and what are the drivers of choice,” Murrie said. “For us, that's around long-term performance, highly competitive fees that we offer - very important in superannuation.” Younger members joining the fund are specifically looking for environmental commitments, she said, though they’re seeing existing members move money to more ESG-friendly categories of investment. Unisuper wasn’t early to the ESG movement – Murrie hired its first Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) specialist earlier this year and noted its employees had pushed a reconciliation action plan (RAP), a switch to renewable energy and recycling initiatives off their own bat before that.

“We have around $12bn, and that was at 30 June, invested in these type of products… it’s really going back to what the members want. Hopefully by doing so, we're able to drive positive change in companies that we invest in,” she said.

Unisuper is organically growing in a market that is rapidly deteriorating. While others may be focusing on retaining existing customers in a tight market, Murrie reckons focusing on those four features above are already paying dividends. With an ongoing brand campaign and awareness outside the top 10, Unisuper has only upwards to go.