Executive Summary

This report will put forward a proposal for a plan that aims to increase Great Eastern Lifes
recruitment by 1800 new graduates. It will first analyze the target market for Great Eastern
Lifes recruitment efforts, identifying motivations and desires of the target market as well as
their behavior and beliefs. Based on that, this report then will propose ideas to meet this goal.
The first idea is to rebrand financial planning as a career to address negative perceptions of it.
The other idea is to add a public face to the promotional campaign to make it more relatable.
This report will then explain how these ideas will be executed as strategies targeting
university graduates via three methods.

Target Market Analysis

This report will put forward a proposal for a plan that aims to increase Great Eastern Lifes
recruitment by 1800 new graduates. It will first analyze the target market for Great Eastern
Lifes recruitment efforts, identifying motivations and desires of the target market as well as
their behavior and beliefs. Based on that, this report then will propose ideas to meet this goal.
The first idea is to rebrand financial planning as a career to address negative perceptions of it.
This report will put forward a proposal for a plan that aims to increase Great Eastern Lifes
recruitment by 1800 new graduates. It will first analyze the target market for Great Eastern
Lifes recruitment efforts, identifying motivations and desires of the target market as well as
their behavior and beliefs. Based on that, this report then will propose ideas to meet this goal.
The first idea is to rebrand financial planning as a career to address negative perceptions of it.
The other idea is to add a public face to the promotional campaign to make it more relatable.
This report will then explain how these ideas will be executed as strategies targeting
university graduates via three methods.

The other idea is to add a public face to the promotional campaign to make it more relatable.
This report will put forward a proposal for a plan that aims to increase Great Eastern Lifes
recruitment by 1800 new graduates. It will first analyze the target market for Great Eastern
Lifes recruitment efforts, identifying motivations and desires of the target market as well as
their behavior and beliefs. Based on that, this report then will propose ideas to meet this goal.
The first idea is to rebrand financial planning as a career to address negative perceptions of it.
The other idea is to add a public face to the promotional campaign to make it more relatable.
This report will then explain how these ideas will be executed as strategies targeting
university graduates via three methods.

This report will then explain how these ideas will be executed as strategies targeting
university graduates via three methods.

This section provides an analysis of our target market of fresh graduates aged 25-29 in This
report will put forward a proposal for a plan that aims to increase Great Eastern Lifes
recruitment by 1800 new graduates. It will first analyze the target market for Great Eastern
Lifes recruitment efforts, identifying motivations and desires of the target market as well as
their behavior and beliefs. Based on that, this report then will propose ideas to meet this goal.
The first idea is to rebrand financial planning as a career to address negative perceptions of it.
The other idea is to add a public face to the promotional campaign to make it more relatable.
This report will then explain how these ideas will be executed as strategies targeting
university graduates via three methods.

Singapore. Some of their aspirations, opinions and lifestyle will be further discussed in this
section later.

In Singapore, there are 1.21 million young adults/millennials aged between 20 to 32 in 2016.
What millennials want varies between each individual. However, they possess certain
characteristics common throughout their age group. According to experts at Euromonitor,
millennials seek experiences rather than material objects and goals, they want good value for
money, they want products that speak to them specifically, and they want to be heard and
interacted with.

Aspirations

According to the National Youth Survey in 2013, the most common aspirations for young
adults are: earning a respectable income, having a successful career, acquiring new skills,
having a place of their own and maintaining strong family relationships. Table 1 below
displays the aforementioned attributes.

Top 5 Aspirations of Young Adults (2013)

Money

Career Success

Personal Development

Home Ownership

Familial Relations

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80%

Familial Home Personal Career
Money
Relations Ownership Development Success
Top 5 Aspirations of Young Adults
74% 70% 68% 65% 47%
(2013)

The data shows that even though many young adults value having a successful career (65%),
more value the importance of maintaining strong family relationships (74%). Furthermore,
other important considerations for young adults include work-life balance and career
opportunities.

Media Usage
Millennials are heavy users of social media and usually use more than one social media
platform. Facebook is the leading social network in Singapore. Young adults are most likely
to utilize social media websites from a mobile device.

Table XX and XXX above (e-Marketer, 2015) shows the Top 5 Social Media Sites among
internet users in Singapore in July 2015. Facebook ranks first at 64%, YouTube ranks second
at 43%, and Instagram ranks third at 25%. In terms of social media and messaging app user
penetration, WhatsApp (46%) tops the list, followed by Facebook (43%) and Facebook
Messenger (26%).

In terms of the preferred channels for receiving information in Singapore, majority of internet
users (81%) prefer to receive email. 45% of them prefer to receive SMS, while 31% of them
indicated social media as their preferred choice. (eMarketer, 2015)

Values & Beliefs

Young adults are particular with the brands that they associate with as they believe it
represents their personal identity. To them, brand association, prestige, and quality are
indicators of not only social position, but also their wants and beliefs. It is common for them
to brandish branded goods to display their affiliation. Some see it as a reward for working
hard, whereby owning one is like achieving a milestone. Therefore, the brand and image of a
company is important to the millennials. (Euromonitor, 2016).

Furthermore, there is a prevailing notion that financial planners, colloquially referred to as

insurance salespeople, do not possess high educational qualifications, and engage in
predatory hard-selling practices. The result of this is that most graduates tend to shun such a
career path and avoid associating with such companies, as it conflicts with their personal
identity.

Additionally, the notion regarding financial planners explained above is compounded by

misunderstandings with insurance and financial planning. Even though insurance is an
important aspect of financial planning, it is commonly misunderstood as an unnecessary drain
on ones assets.

Proposed ideas

Based on attitudes of young adults explained above, we have decided to focus our
recruitment of fresh graduates by promoting the purpose of a career in Financial Planning and
the flexible lifestyle as the main value proposition, given the priorities of many young adults
in seeking a job that is compatible with their self-identity as well as desired lifestyle.

The first idea is to launch a promotional campaign. This promotional campaigns concept
pushes for a rebranding of a career in financial planning, and will be conducted on both
online and offline platforms. This rebranding is addressed with multiple ways. Firstly, we
will highlight the significance of insurance and sound financial planning. Next, we will
reinforce the more desirable image of financial planners as selfless people seeking to help
others in need. Finally, we will also present the benefits of such a career, namely its
flexibility and work-life balance. This idea will address negative perceptions and
misunderstandings regarding financial planning, and also bring to light more desirable
aspects of a career in financial planning.

The second idea is to give a public face to the representatives of Great Eastern Life. This
public face will be a group of young and successful financial planners who are selected to
become Great Eastern Lifes spokespeople. They will act as the face of the recruitment drive
and share their journey through personal stories. The stories shared will highlight benefits
that correspond to the aforementioned goals that young adults aim to achieve, namely close
familial relations and personal development. The message conveyed will be through a
personality that fresh graduates are able to relate to, allowing them to be more receptive to
considering a career in financial planning.
Strategy Execution

The ideas proposed above will be implemented by reaching out to fresh graduates through
different methods, namely: social media, natural friends, events, and education.

Social Media

The approach from social media will engage them through websites fresh graduates
frequently use, Facebook and Instagram, in the form of short videos. The media content
posted on these websites aimed at reaching out to fresh graduates will focus on individual
stories to bring to light the significance of financial planning as an activity and financial
planners roles in the lives of people. By telling individual stories, we help our audience to
empathize with the message being conveyed and lead them to understand financial planning
from a different opinion.

Natural Friends

This strategy takes advantage of networks of friends. This strategy is to recruit policyholders
who are currently university students with the aim of getting them to share with their friends
the benefits of financial planning and insurance. Given the general sentiment regarding
insurance as something that they probably do not need, it is more likely that graduates will
heed the advice of natural friends over a financial planning company like Great Eastern Life.
The improved sentiment that would be a result of this strategy will then change their opinions
towards insurance in general and thereafter also help them view a career in financial planning
as something more than merely pushing sales of financial products.

Events

We recommend that Great Eastern Life reach out to university events on local campuses.
Events, such as social camps or sporting events tend to draw attention from the student body
and also opportunities for corporate sponsorship. During the events, we recommend that a
successful graduate from that university who is currently working in Great Eastern Life to be
the speaker sharing experiences and opportunities in this career, so that the message resonates
better with students of that particular school.

Career fairs are one of the most important channel for fresh graduates who are looking for a
suitable career to find out more information. It is the place where we will be looking at a
target audience that are ready and receptive to information regarding to the respective careers.

Education

To address negative opinions of the general public towards insurance and financial planning,
a financial literacy program should be implemented on the secondary to pre-tertiary level to
emphasize the importance of insurance in everyday life and also that sound financial planning
can help achieve the goals/needs.

in order to overcome this negative perceptions of the general population has towards the
industry, education is important as it will address the negative conceptions people have. And
this education should be preferably before the adult years as adults tend to have fixed beliefs
and opinions which is harder to change.

Conclusion

Given the characteristics of our target audience of university graduates, the plan to recruit
them should pay more attention to