We built a psychology-led digital acquisition strategy targeting U/HNWI's in the UK, to increase qualified leads and strengthen HSBC’s position as a leading private banking and wealth management provider.
HSBC Private Bank is the principal private banking division of the HSBC Group, offering bespoke wealth management services. These include global investment opportunities, succession planning guidance, wealth management, philanthropy support, and more - all tailored to HNW (high-net-worth) and UHNW (ultra-high-net-worth) individuals.
HSBC Private Bank needed to strengthen its presence in the UK by targeting an U/HNWI audience that had remained relatively untapped through digital channels. The primary objective was clear: build a robust, psychologically grounded digital acquisition strategy that would drive more form submissions, deliver more qualified leads, and ultimately continue to establish HSBC Private Bank as a leading service provider in this space.
Cognition was tasked with designing and delivering a comprehensive acquisition framework that combined behavioural science, decision theory, and digital experimentation. By leveraging psychological insight and rigorous testing, we created distinctive campaign ideas to raise awareness, generate engagement, and guide UHNWIs from first contact through to conversion.
At the core of this work was our unique approach rooted in behavioural science. We translated a deep understanding of psychology into creative, evidence-led campaign executions, tailored to the often-complex nuances of a U/HNW audience. With the added advantage of drawing on our Scientific Board of psychologists, neuroscientists and statisticians, we ultimately built a foundation of psychology-driven insights that informed each strategic step for HSBC Private Bank - from brand positioning to campaign optimisation.
Financial Services
UK
Build a robust, psychologically grounded digital acquisition strategy to engage U/HNWI's.
Significant uplift in engagement, lead geenration and conversions across digital channels compared to baseline benchmarks.
The project began with a collaborative planning workshop. This session established core project goals and KPIs, while surfacing key questions around value proposition, current messaging, and opportunities to better engage UHNWIs.
We then conducted a detailed competitor analysis, benchmarking HSBC Private Bank against current sector leaders, assessing the psychological accessibility of their messaging. This was paired with one-to-one interviews with key senior internal stakeholders across HSBC Private Bank. The questions included in these interview sessions were specifically designed to uncover real perceptions of HSBC Private Bank’s strengths, differentiators, and potential areas for improvement.
And finally, we reviewed existing literature and applied insights from various decision science research papers, directly relevant to the specific psychology of UHNWIs. Traits such as loss aversion, authority bias, confidence bias, high conscientiousness, agentic decision-making, and an internal locus of control - together, these provided a powerful framework for designing digital campaigns that truly resonated.
Equipped with the detailed insights from our Data System, we developed a compelling narrative framework to inform our subsequent campaign executions. This began with creating core messaging pillars, each aligned with how U/HNWIs process information, establish trust, and make financial decisions.
These pillars enabled us to build clear and psychologically robust campaign propositions, providing a flexible platform for messaging across multiple markets and channels. From here, we developed sample messages, adapting language, tone, and visual cues to align with the distinct decision-making drivers most relevant to this audience.
All stages in our Story System ultimately led to building a series of creative campaign concepts (‘adcepts’), showing how each messaging pillar could be activated across multiple digital formats. Each campaign idea was designed to leverage behavioural nudges (from anchoring to cognitive ease), to encourage action and drive high-value prospects through the funnel.
The Engagement System focused on bringing HSBC Private Bank’s new digital strategy and story to life. We designed a structured testing model once all campaign executions were approved; core testing variables included message, creative design, call-to-action, format, timing, and targeting. Each ‘test’ was built around clear hypotheses, enabling us to uncover not only what worked - but also why.
Campaign performance was continuously monitored against agreed KPIs from our Data System workshop session, with all insights used to refine live activity in real time. We then consolidated all findings into a comprehensive acquisition playbook, providing HSBC Private Bank with a scalable framework they could roll out across global markets in 2026. The playbook consolidated proven strategies, creative best practices, channel optimisation tactics, and psychological triggers identified throughout the campaign.
At the heart of this entire project was the strategic application of behavioural science to campaign design. By grounding the process in decision-making theory, we moved beyond surface-level data to understand the psychological drivers underpinning financial choice.
From identifying cognitive biases such as loss aversion, scarcity, and authority bias, to structuring messages for cognitive ease and building trust - we ensured that HSBC Private Bank’s acquisition framework was not only data-driven, but psychologically robust and tailored to the way UHNWIs truly make decisions.
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