Creative · Production · Post
In partnership with Haymarket
Barclays
A test-and-measure recruitment campaign for people who'd never considered banking.
Creative · Production · Post
In partnership with Haymarket
A test-and-measure recruitment campaign for people who'd never considered banking.
01 The brief
Barclays had a recruitment problem that wasn't really about recruitment. There was no shortage of people who could do the jobs - customer-facing roles in hospitality, retail and beauty are all great launch pads for branch banking. The problem was that nobody in those industries was really considering a career at Barclays. It simply hadn't occurred to them.
The brief was to see how we could change that - not with a glossy corporate campaign, but to test the water with something that felt real enough to make someone stop scrolling and think: that could be me.
02 What we did
We landed on a series of before and after films that showed relatable characters in scenes scripted from genuine Barclays employee stories. We shot on location around Brighton rather than building sets, which made logistics harder but the films considerably more believable for the budget.
We took two weeks from the discovery call to delivery. To keep control of both the schedule and the performances, we cast actors and voice artists separately. No dialogue on set meant no wasted time in a busy pizzeria waiting for the lunch crowd to clear. We kept a lean crew but still with enough hands to help things move smoothly. Even if budgets are tight you do a project more harm than good by having just one too few names on the callsheet.
The films ran as an A/B testing campaign across Twitter, Facebook and Instagram, with the before and after structure allowing Barclays to measure response at each stage.
03 The result
Both films drove an immediate spike in applications on release and helped Barclays look again at their hiring approach. It's a model we've used in various forms since, for the NHS, for Amazon, for Bright Horizons - using film to reach candidates who might have been looking, but just didn't realise it yet.