The encyclopedia · Finance & Accounting · Marketing decision · 2021–2023
UNIQA made 'How are you?' honest and sold insurance on the back of it
UNIQA used athletes and musicians sharing mental-health struggles to destigmatize the topic; 320,000 took its test, business rose 10%, ROI 920%.
UNIQA
The solution
Slovak mental health deteriorated through the pandemic, yet more than 70% of people believed society still attached shame to mental-health disorders — and the automatic answer to 'How are you?' remained 'fine'. People avoided help until crisis, and insurers were the last voice anyone expected to speak up.
UNIQA and agency TRIAD built 'Speak honestly about your mental discomfort', addressing Slovaks and Czechs directly. Rather than lecturing, the campaign put trusted public figures on screen: Olympic ski champion Petra Vlhová and Czech skier Martina Dubovská spoke honestly at press conferences, singers Celeste Buckingham and Zuzana Smatanová shared their experiences with the League for Mental Health, and a TV spot showed an ordinary worker confiding in a colleague.
Every output funneled to a campaign site where people could test their mental health, learn how to talk about it, and find UNIQA's life-insurance offer. The site drew up to 200,000 visits, with 229 earned media outputs and a +41% lift in year-on-year top-of-mind awareness.
Effie Europe measured 320,000 people taking the wellbeing test, a 920% ROI and a 10% business improvement — earning a Bronze Effie for positive change and proving that an insurer could grow by removing stigma rather than selling fear.
Why it worked
- Real stories from admired athletes and musicians gave the message authenticity ads can't fake.
- The wellbeing test gave people a concrete, private first step before any sales ask.
- Being first among insurers made the brand own a category-defining conversation.
- The tie to life insurance turned trust into an actual product choice.
What can be applied
A stigmatized category can be the moat: the first brand brave enough to name it owns the conversation. Link the empathy to a concrete first step and a product, so virtue converts into business.
Aftermath
The campaign ran from 2021 and kept producing earned media and cultural impact into 2023, when Effie Europe recognized it with a Bronze. It became a regional reference for purpose-led insurance marketing and pushed UNIQA's mental-health positioning into its product line, showing that a financial-services brand can lead a social conversation and still hit double-digit business growth.
Sources
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