Fidelity’s 2026 Video Ads Boost ESG Comprehension

When the 2026 ISS policy survey dropped, it confirmed what we’d been seeing on the ground: corporate messaging is shifting hard into video ads to manage how stakeholders see them. Here’s a teardown of how one financial giant, Fidelity Investments, used a big video spend to get their updated ESG investment policy in front of institutional investors and corporate clients. The big question is, can you really use targeted video to move the needle when you’re explaining something this complicated?

Campaign Overview: Fidelity’s ESG Policy Communication

So, in early 2026, the Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS) global policy survey came out, and everyone’s expectations for corporate ESG were officially on notice. This put Fidelity Investments in a tight spot. They had a revised ESG policy, a monster of a document with new screening rules and engagement plans, and they had to explain it to an audience that doesn’t have time for fluff, institutional investors, pension fund managers, and corporate treasurers. They knew the usual white papers and webinars were just getting ignored, so they decided a targeted video ad campaign was the only way to cut through.

The campaign, which they called “Sustainable Returns, Shared Future,” was an eight-week push from March to May 2026. The $1.8 million budget wasn’t small, but it showed how seriously they took getting this policy update right for their brand and their big-money clients. Our main job was to get people to actually understand and use the new ESG policy, which we measured by tracking who engaged with the content and who sent in direct questions. We also had a softer goal of trying to bump up their brand perception as a company that’s serious about sustainable investing.

Strategic Approach: Precision Targeting Meets Policy Nuance

Fidelity’s whole game plan was based on a simple idea: even data-obsessed institutional investors are still human, and they respond to a clear explanation from a voice of authority. We ran the campaign across a few platforms but put most of our chips on LinkedIn Marketing Solutions, since its targeting for professional audiences is unbeatable. We also used Google Ads to run pre-roll and in-stream ads on YouTube, and then threw in some programmatic display to retarget anyone who showed interest.

Targeting Parameters:

• LinkedIn: We built our audience using job titles like “Portfolio Manager,” “Chief Investment Officer,” and “Head of ESG,” and then filtered for companies with over 500 employees. The geographic targeting was surgical, focusing on specific districts like Wall Street in NYC, Canary Wharf in London, and the Central Business District in Singapore, plus key financial zones in Frankfurt and Tokyo.
• Google Ads (YouTube): Here, we created custom intent audiences by targeting people searching for terms like “ESG investing frameworks” and “sustainable finance regulations.” We also did placement targeting to make sure our ads ran on financial news channels and specific business analysis shows.

The goal for our cost per qualified lead (CPL) was to keep it under $150. We defined a qualified lead as an institutional investor who watched at least 75% of one of the policy videos and then went on to download the full ESG policy doc or fill out an inquiry form. We were hoping to get 12,000 of these conversions over the eight weeks.

Creative Execution: Explainer Videos and Executive Insights

We ran two different types of video ads, each with a specific job:

1. Animated Explainer Videos (60-90 seconds): These were the workhorses for the really dense stuff. We used motion graphics and a clear voiceover to explain things like the new carbon footprint metrics or how the proxy voting guidelines were changing. Using visual metaphors to explain financial concepts turned out to be a huge help.
2. Executive Testimonial Videos (30-45 seconds): For these, we got Fidelity’s Head of Sustainable Investing and a senior Portfolio Manager on camera. The point was to put a human face on the policy and show they were committed. We kept the scripts loose to make sure it felt authentic.

We shot everything in 4K and used professional voice actors and custom music to make sure it all looked and sounded as polished as the Fidelity brand. During the campaign, we A/B tested different video lengths and where to place the call-to-action. What was interesting is that the longer 90-second animated videos did better than the 60-second ones, which tells you this audience will stick around for a deep dive if the topic matters. The best performing CTA was a simple “Download Full Policy” button that showed up in the last 15 seconds, sending people straight to a landing page.

Performance Metrics: A Detailed Breakdown

Looking at the numbers, the campaign was a mixed bag, but we learned a lot. It turns out our initial forecasts, especially for how many people would actually convert, were a bit too high.

We served more impressions than we thought and got a higher CTR, which means the ads were getting seen and people were interested. But the conversion rate didn’t keep up, which is why our Cost Per Conversion ended up being $171 instead of the $150 we were shooting for. That told us we had a leak somewhere in the funnel.

What Worked Well

The animated explainers were the undisputed champs. We ran a post-campaign survey with 2,000 people who saw the ads, and the ones who watched the animated videos reported a 15% higher understanding of the policy than a control group. Being able to see a visual breakdown of something abstract like green bond screening just works, even for a technical audience. It’s exactly what Nielsen data has been telling us for years about visual storytelling helping people remember things.

Also, the hyper-specific geographic targeting we did on LinkedIn for financial districts was a huge win. The CTR in London and Singapore was sitting at 6.7%, which was way higher than the campaign’s global average. It’s proof that spending your money in the right zip codes really matters.

Areas for Improvement and Optimization

The big headache was our targeting on Google Ads and YouTube. We thought a “financial professional” audience segment would be good enough, but it was way too broad and pulled in a ton of people who weren’t our target, like retail brokers or personal financial advisors. We ended up calculating about 20% wasted ad spend just from hitting the wrong eyeballs. It’s a painful reminder that even with all the tools we have, your audience definition is never really ‘done’.

Our other issue was the landing page. The first version of the download form was asking for eight fields of information, including things like company revenue and AUM. People were hitting the page and then just leaving, giving us a 25% drop-off rate. That’s a lot of lost leads. A simpler form with just three or four fields would have done a much better job.

Optimization Steps Taken (Mid-Campaign and Post-Campaign)

We didn’t just sit around and watch the numbers tank. After the first two weeks, we saw the data coming in and made some quick changes:

1. Refined Google Ads Audience: We tightened up our custom intent audiences by adding more specific, high-value keywords like “ESG portfolio construction for endowments.” We also built out a negative keyword list to block searches from the retail side.
2. A/B Tested Landing Page Forms: We immediately set up an A/B test on the download page, with one version having far fewer fields. That simpler version got a 15% higher completion rate in the first three days, so we switched everyone over to it.
3. Increased Retargeting Budget: We took some budget and pushed it toward retargeting people who watched at least half of a video but didn’t convert. Instead of just showing them the same download ad, we hit them with a new CTA offering a direct link to book a call with a Fidelity ESG specialist.

Looking back, these fixes definitely helped improve our efficiency, but the damage from that initial broad targeting on Google Ads was already done, and it dragged down our overall CPC. For the next one of these, I’d argue for a much slower, more controlled rollout, starting with only the most hyper-targeted audiences and only expanding once we see good conversion numbers.

Conclusion

Fidelity’s “Sustainable Returns, Shared Future” campaign proved that you can use video to explain really difficult corporate policies, even to a tough crowd in the financial world. The campaign did its main job of making the policy easier to understand, but it also exposed how a sloppy audience definition or a clunky landing page can wreck your ROI. If you’re going to try and explain something complicated, you have to invest in creative that makes it simple and be absolutely obsessive about who you’re targeting. Otherwise, you’re just shouting into the wind.

This whole project is a good look at how targeted video ads can boost conversions and make dense information digestible. The lessons here about getting your audience right and making your landing page frictionless are things we can all apply to get a better return on our ad spend.