BFSI marketing 2026: The next phase of familiarity, trust, and AI

India’s BFSI sector has never lacked scale. What it has historically struggled with is meaningful connection.

As the sector heads into 2026, that gap is becoming impossible to ignore. Market capitalisation has crossed the $1 trillion mark. Digital payments have gone mainstream. Insurance, banking and investments now sit inside everyday apps and platforms. And yet, insurance penetration remains stuck at 3.7% of GDP, barely half the global average. Insurance density stands at just $97 per capita, compared to a global average of $943.

For BFSI marketers, the message is clear: reach has outpaced relevance.

What’s unfolding now is not a cosmetic shift in campaigns or platforms, but a deeper reset of how BFSI brands think about trust, engagement, language, technology and timing.

From awareness to familiarity

If there is one phrase that captures the marketing mood in BFSI heading into 2026, it is this: awareness is no longer enough.

Over the last decade, banks and insurers have successfully built scale, reach and visibility. Today, most large BFSI brands enjoy near-universal awareness in urban markets. Yet, familiarity — a deeper understanding of what a brand stands for, how it behaves, and whether it can be trusted when it matters — remains uneven.

“My biggest resolution for 2026 is to deepen familiarity, not just awareness,” says Sapna Desai, Chief Marketing Officer, ManipalCigna Health Insurance. “Being known is easy. Being understood takes sustained effort.”

This shift is being driven by two parallel forces: rising consumer fatigue and growing category scepticism. With BFSI advertising intensifying during peak periods like January to March, consumers are exposed to more messages than ever — but with diminishing attention and patience. As a result, marketing effectiveness is increasingly tied to clarity and credibility rather than creative loudness.

At HDFC ERGO, this has meant anchoring brand communication around what Somesh Surana, Joint President - Digital Business Group & Marketing, HDFC ERGO calls the category’s only real product. “In insurance, the only product we truly sell is claims,” he says. “We exist to tell people that we are reliable when it comes to claims.”

Instead of abstract promises, HDFC ERGO’s storytelling is built on proof points — its 23-year operating history, over ₹21,000 crore in health insurance claims paid, and a claims settlement ratio of 97.5%. “This is what we focus on across different media because that is the real product we offer,” Surana explains.

The second pillar, he adds, is performance marketing. “While brand trust comes naturally to us, we invest heavily in performance marketing to acquire high-intent customers.” The third — and increasingly critical — pillar is engagement. “Insurance interaction is limited to purchase, renewal or claims. That creates a churn risk. Engagement, therefore, becomes a core part of our marketing strategy.”

There is also a structural shift underway in how discovery happens. Desai notes that brand discovery is no longer confined to owned platforms or campaign bursts. “It will increasingly happen through conversations, communities and organic content,” she says. “AI-led personalisation will grow, but empathy-led storytelling will remain essential.”

For BFSI marketers, this creates a delicate balancing act. On one hand, AI and performance-driven systems are making targeting, optimisation and scale more efficient. On the other hand, over-automation risks stripping communication of the human reassurance that financial decisions demand.

“The future belongs to brands that listen well, respond thoughtfully, and stay human while scaling intelligently,” Desai adds.

Despite rapid digitisation, BFSI leaders are increasingly vocal about the limits of a digital-only mindset.

“One belief we need to unlearn is overemphasising digital,” says MVS Murthy, Chief Marketing Officer, Federal Bank. “At the core, we are human, with digital supporting us. Maintaining the human touch is critical.”

He also stresses the importance of discipline. “This is an extremely competitive space. Marketers must track numbers closely. If the lead dog is not sensing what’s happening, everyone behind them gets misled.”

For Murthy, 2026 will be defined by two things: ease of experience and trust. “It’s no longer about how good a brand looks. It’s about how it makes you feel, whether you can trust it, and whether its purpose is genuine or just a façade.”

This emphasis on experience over aesthetics is echoed across the sector.

The quarter that decides the year

January to March has always been important for BFSI. But in recent years, it has become decisive.

Tax planning, policy renewals, fresh investments and health insurance purchases converge into a single quarter. Industry estimates suggest BFSI advertising spends crossed ₹5,000 crore in FY25, with a disproportionate share concentrated in this period. In health insurance alone, nearly 60–65% of annual business is generated between December and March.

"For us, it’s not just January to March. We look at it as December, January, February and March—DJFM," says Surana.“These four months are extremely important for health insurance. Naturally, marketing budgets, campaigns and media intensity are aligned accordingly.”

This concentration of demand is forcing marketers to be sharper about what they say, where they say it, and how often they show up.

Recently, Federal Bank refreshed its identity after 94-long years. And for the bank, the timing of its recent brand refresh was no coincidence. “Yes, this is very much part of our JFM strategy,” says Murthy. “Our analysis clearly shows that whenever there has been a campaign or a marketing initiative, business numbers go up — of course, depending on seasonality.”

But Murthy is clear that visibility spikes alone are not the real metric. “Validation will happen over time. The brand will be carried by our people in branches, localised events, and micro-marketing efforts. It spreads gradually, like a monsoon moving across the country.”

Gen Z, millennials and the shifting centre of gravity

Underpinning all of this is a demographic reset.

“In the next couple of years, the wallet will be with millennials and Gen Z,” says Ravindra Sharma, Chief of Brand, Corporate Communications & CSR at SBI Life Insurance. “Up to 65–70% of the buying power will sit with this population.”

India already has the world’s largest Gen Z cohort, and research consistently shows that while these consumers are digital-first, they are also deeply sceptical. They compare relentlessly, question authority, and rarely commit without reassurance. More importantly, they are chronically online — discovering, evaluating and validating financial products through social platforms, creators, and peer conversations rather than traditional brand-led communication.

This shift has significant implications for tone and messaging in BFSI. “As BFSI, you need to be mindful of who you are talking to and what you are talking about,” Sharma adds. The challenge is no longer just simplification, but credibility — speaking in ways that feel authentic to an audience that distrusts hard-selling and institutional language.

For younger consumers, especially Gen Z and millennials, the expectation from financial brands is already shifting from transactional service to ongoing support. This cohort wants guidance, reassurance and relevance across life stages — not just at moments of purchase or crisis.

It is this behavioural shift that Desai is responding to when she looks ahead to the end of the decade. By 2030, she believes the sector will move beyond emotional storytelling altogether. “Health insurance brands will shift from being service providers to genuine life partners,” she says. “Messaging will focus on demonstrating real experiences of care and support.”

Her ambition for ManipalCigna reflects that expectation. “Not just a health insurer you think of during claims,” Desai adds, “but a trusted expert partner you rely on for health and well-being decisions.”

For insurers, reaching this audience increasingly means meeting them where they already spend their time — on social feeds shaped by creators they trust. Surana acknowledges that influencer marketing, once viewed cautiously in a regulated category, is becoming unavoidable.

“Influencer marketing is very real,” Surana says. “In insurance, we need to be careful, but it is an effective way to reach audiences who may not engage with traditional digital platforms.”

HDFC ERGO’s approach has been deliberately measured. The insurer has worked with 13 creators, reaching over 26.4 million users with an engagement rate of 3.2%, with a strong emphasis on micro and nano influencers to preserve authenticity. “We’ve partnered with creators to narrate real claims stories, explain third-party insurance, and even highlight the role of insurance advisors,” Surana explains, “challenging negative perceptions around the category.”

The logic is straightforward: for a generation that learns from reels, Reddit threads and creator explainers, trust is increasingly built socially, not institutionally. In that context, influencer-led education is less about promotion and more about translation, turning complex financial products into narratives that feel understandable, credible and human.

AI and what comes next 

If trust remains the core currency in BFSI, AI is fast becoming its most powerful accelerant.

At HDFC ERGO, artificial intelligence has already moved beyond pilot projects and into the heart of marketing operations. “All our performance marketing campaigns are now AI-driven,” says Somesh Surana. The insurer was among the first in the category to become a Google Preferred Partner for AI-led campaigns, using machine learning to improve targeting precision, creative optimisation and lead quality.

The impact is visible not just in media efficiency, but in how consumers are discovering insurance. Search behaviour itself is shifting. “Queries coming from LLM platforms have tripled in the last three months,” Surana notes, adding that conversion rates from these platforms are nearly 2.5 times higher than traditional search channels, even if volumes are still smaller.

On the creative side, AI is compressing timelines that were once considered fixed. A recent travel insurance film was produced in under an hour using AI tools — a process that would earlier have taken weeks. “Agencies remain critical for strategy and concept,” Surana says, “but AI will increasingly speed up execution.”

Looking ahead to 2026 and beyond, Desai believes the next phase of BFSI marketing will be defined not by how much AI brands use, but by how human they remain while using it.

“My biggest resolution is to deepen familiarity, not just awareness,” Desai says. “Being known is easy. Being understood takes sustained effort.” As brand discovery moves beyond owned platforms into conversations, communities and organic content, she expects AI-led personalisation to grow — but not at the cost of empathy. “The future belongs to brands that listen well, respond thoughtfully, and stay human while scaling intelligently.”

By 2030, Desai sees the sector moving beyond even emotional storytelling to what she calls experiential partnership. “Health insurance brands will shift from being service providers to genuine life partners,” she says. “Messaging will focus less on features and more on demonstrating real experiences of care and support.”

In that future, technology will enable deeper personalisation and efficiency, but authenticity will remain the differentiator. “Consumers are increasingly informed and empowered,” Desai adds. “Brands that combine tech-enabled efficiency with empathy will lead.”

The future of BFSI marketing will belong to brands that combine technology with trust, and reach younger, digitally savvy consumers with empathy and relevance.