2023 Silver Financial Services

Agency: House 337

Client: Santander

Entry Title: Stop! Scammertime!

Executive Summary

Fraud and scams are a big problem, draining time, money and energy from banks, individuals and society. But most people don’t think they would ever fall for a scam, so they ignore communications they feel are aimed at others.

Strategy

The brand’s strategy was to entertain its way past people’s firewalls with an unmissable and unforgettable earworm, leaving them with a message they could not help but remember—even if they didn’t think it was relevant to them.

Using the ‘Bank of Antandec’ theme, an iconic 90s track and some very silly pants, the agency created a campaign that could not be missed and which the audience would easily remember.

Creativity

In this execution, Ant & Dec identified a real consumer challenge—the fact that anyone can fall for a scam. To combat the problem, they have invented ‘fraud-detecting scammer pants’: bright red, MC Hammer-style parachute pants that inflated and start playing music when the wearer receives a scam text.

The duo performed a scam-themed rendition of ‘U Can't Touch This’, complete with Hammer-style dance moves and a call to ‘Stop! Scammertime!’ when approached by fraudsters.

Because anyone can fall victim to a scam, the campaign used TV, cinema, and radio to maximise reach. Digital channels were embraced to target people in situations in which they were more likely to fall victim to a scam.

Results

Expectations for this campaign were modest - it was Santander’s first major TV-led anti-scam campaign. It met or out-performed expectations on every measure, capturing audience attention, landing the message, prompting them to educate themselves further and reducing the amount of money lost to fraud and scams.

The amount lost to fraud and scams at Santander decreased by 30% during the campaign period. Because the campaign communicated a simple method for protection from fraudulent approaches, it is likely that those who received and remembered the message will continue to be more resilient in the future.

Visits to the ‘stopping fraud and scams’ page on Santander.co.uk increased by 7000% during the campaign. People who considered Santander to be active in preventing fraud and scams increased from 21% to 31% over the course of the campaign. There were also 1.1 billion UK views for user-generated content with the campaign hashtag on TikTok.

Contributors

Carat, Hogarth and Vidsy