Client: University College Birmingham
University College Birmingham (UCB) briefed SHC Digital to devise, implement & optimise an integrated digital campaign for its 2021/2022 academic college intake. The campaign needed to reach students aged 15-16 across the UK’s second biggest city, Birmingham, making them aware of the wide range of practical vocational courses available, as well as drive completed applications. Google restricts targeting under 16s across the platform, ruling out YouTube as well as programmatic and display tactics. The campaign called for an integrated approach targeting not only students but their parents too, enabling UCB to leverage core conversion tactics across the Google network. The media plan focused on awareness, consideration & conversion tactics. From a channel mix perspective, parents were targeted via Google, Meta & Spotify and students via Meta, TikTok, Snapchat and Spotify. SHC needed to find a workaround to target students across the Goggle network. We researched many platforms and found an education-specific one which used mobile data to target under 16s with display and YouTube ads. We carried out an initial four-week trial before rolling out the activity to target students across both display and YouTube placements. The campaign creative of ‘Level Up with UCB’ was tailored to resonate with both parents and students and the ad creative was refreshed three times throughout the campaign period, to avoid creative fatigue and maximise wider awareness. The campaign delivered a significant uplift in completed applications compared to the previous year & data shows the quality of the applications was also higher.
