ibW open day: 550'000+ impressions and 308'000 people reached with programmatic ads

Background

ibW Höhere Fachschule Südostschweiz is one of the most important education providers in eastern Switzerland. From technology to business to IT, its range of further training is broad and of high quality. The challenge: how do you reach working people in the region who might be interested in further training but are not actively looking yet?

The annual open day and the regular online information evenings are key events for ibW to win new students. But the traditional promotion through print adverts and organic social media posts had reached its limits. The reach could not be planned, the targeting was imprecise, and the results could hardly be measured.

What ibW needed was a digital channel that could do three things at once: reach the right audience in the right region, show visually appealing ads and make the results measurable.

How we went about it

Programmatic advertising: what is it?

In short, programmatic advertising means that ads are placed automatically and in real time on websites that suit the target audience. Instead of booking individual websites by hand, a DSP (demand-side platform, an automated buying platform) buys suitable ad space within milliseconds. This lets you reach the right people, on the right websites, at the right time.

For ibW, this means that the ads appear on Swiss websites such as 20min.ch, Blick.ch, watson.ch, SBB.ch, NZZ.ch and many more. That is exactly where the target audience reads the news and looks for information.

Targeting: four approaches that work together

We used four complementary targeting approaches:

• Interest targeting: reaching people who are interested in education, further training or business topics. This reached people who are actively thinking about their career.
• Contextual targeting: the ads were shown on websites whose content fits education or business. As a result, the ads appear in a suitable context and are seen as more relevant.
• Smart targeting: using the DSP’s algorithmic targeting, which automatically identifies the most promising audiences based on user behaviour.
• Retargeting: reaching people again who had already visited the ibW website but had not yet converted, meaning they had not registered.

The ads: display and video

We developed several ad formats, both animated display banners and video formats:

• Video End VT: the best-performing ad, with a CTR (click-through rate, meaning how many people click on the ad) of 0.48% and the most post-click conversions
• Carousel on Scroll: an interactive format that showed different further training programmes while scrolling
• Fly-In Scroller: an animated banner that slides into view while scrolling
• Spin on Scroll: a creative rotating format designed to catch attention

The key insight: video formats consistently performed better than pure display formats. The highest CTR, 0.59%, came from contextual video targeting in the education sector.

Geography and demographics

The targeting focused clearly on eastern Switzerland: the cantons of Graubünden, St. Gallen, Thurgau, Appenzell, Glarus and Schaffhausen. In other words, exactly ibW’s catchment area. The target audience was people aged 18 and over who might be interested in further training.

Tracking: everything measurable

Alongside the campaigns, we set up comprehensive conversion tracking in Google Tag Manager. We tracked not only clicks and impressions but also “soft” conversions:

• Form submissions for information evening registrations, consultations and course registrations
• Scroll depth on programme pages (how far do visitors read?)
• Time on page on course pages (more than 3 minutes = real interest)
• Clicks on phone numbers and email addresses as contact conversions

So we knew not only how many people saw the ads, but also what they did afterwards on the ibW website.

The results in detail

Four campaigns ran over the whole of 2024:

Open day campaign (February/March 2024):

• Runtime: 23 February to 15 March
• 323’000+ impressions among 83’000+ individual people
• 1’206 clicks
• Best CTR: education contextual video with 0.59%

Three online information evening campaigns (May, September, November 2024):

• 228’000+ impressions among 225’000+ individual people
• 857 clicks
• Retargeting with the highest CTR (up to 0.75%)

Full year 2024:

• 550’000+ impressions on premium Swiss websites
• 308’000+ unique viewers, meaning more than 308’000 individual people reached in eastern Switzerland
• 2’063 clicks on the ads
• Placements on major websites: Blick.ch (26’000+ impressions), 20min.ch, watson.ch, SBB.ch, NZZ.ch, Tagblatt.ch and many more

Particularly notable: the retargeting campaigns reached CTRs of up to 0.75%, the highest value of all four campaigns. This shows that people who have already visited the ibW website click much more often when they see a targeted ad again.

What you can take from this

1. Programmatic advertising is not just for large corporations. Regional education providers and SMEs can also advertise on premium websites in a targeted way. ibW reached more than 308’000 people in its target region.

2. Video beats display. The video formats consistently performed better than static or animated display banners. If you invest in programmatic, invest in video production. It pays off.

3. Contextual targeting works particularly well in education. When your ad appears on a page that matches your offer, it is seen as more relevant. The highest CTR (0.59%) came from education contextual video targeting.

4. Retargeting is a must. People who have already visited your website are the most valuable audience. A targeted retargeting campaign brings these prospects back, with clearly higher click rates.

5. Measure soft conversions. Not every contact leads straight to a registration. But scroll depth and time on page show you who is really interested. This tracking is the basis for smart optimisation.

6. Consistency beats one-off campaigns. ibW does not only promote its open day once a year. It uses regular online information evenings to stay visible all year round. Four campaigns spread over the year keep the brand in the audience’s mind.