Overview

London, UK | Heathrow Airport

Campaign period: 2 February – 29 March 2026

Placement types: Small format DOOH & T5 Towers

A global B2B professional services firm partnered with billups to launch a targeted Out-of-Home (OOH) campaign at London Heathrow Airport, designed to engage senior business decision-makers during key moments in transit.

The campaign combined strategically placed airport OOH with a formal Brand Lift Study, enabling the team to measure the impact of the activity across awareness, familiarity, advertising recall, recommendation and brand favourability.

The strength of the results provided evidence to support further investment, with a short-term UK budget shift enabling the campaign to expand into a full takeover across all London Heathrow terminals.

Key Results

50% of senior decision-makers reported a ‘Much More Favourable’ perception of the B2B professional services firm following the campaign.

• 69% of respondents recalled seeing the campaign at Heathrow Airport.

• 88% of respondents said they were likely to recommend the firm to a colleague.

• 94% of respondents were familiar with the firm following the campaign.

• 87% of respondents viewed the firm favourably following the campaign.

• 27% of respondents named the firm unaided when asked to identify B2B professional services firms.

Objective

To measure the impact of OOH on brand metrics among senior business decision-makers in an airport environment, using pre- and post-campaign research.

The Brand Lift Study assessed changes across the brand funnel, including awareness, familiarity, advertising recall, favourability and likelihood to recommend.

Audience: Director-level+ respondents who had visited an airport in the past month.

The Challenge

Reaching senior executives with B2B advertising requires the ability to cut through high-density media environments and reach decision-makers in relevant professional mindsets.

The challenge was not simply to generate exposure, but to demonstrate whether OOH could influence brand perception and deliver measurable value beyond standard paid-media metrics.

The campaign also needed to provide evidence that could inform future investment and support the case for greater media scale without relying on unsupported assumptions around direct commercial conversion.

The Solution

billups planned and deployed a targeted OOH presence at London Heathrow Airport, using small format DOOH and T5 Tower placements to reach business travellers moving through the airport.

The airport environment provided a focused opportunity to reach senior business decision-makers while they were in transit. Rather than evaluating the campaign solely through media delivery, the activation was paired with a formal Brand Lift Study to understand audience response.

This created a measurement framework that connected the media activity with changes in brand awareness, familiarity, recall, recommendation and favourability.

Brand Lift Study Results

• 50% More Favourable — 50% of respondents reported viewing the firm much more favourably following the campaign.

• 69% Ad Recall — 69% of respondents recalled seeing the campaign at Heathrow Airport.

• 88% Likely to Recommend — 88% said they were likely to recommend the firm to a colleague.

• 87% Favourability — 87% of respondents viewed the firm favourably following the campaign.

• 94% Brand Familiarity — 94% of respondents said they were familiar with the firm.

• 27% Unaided Awareness — 27% spontaneously named the firm when asked to identify B2B professional services firms.

What the Results Tell Us

The campaign delivered strong results across awareness, familiarity, advertising recall, recommendation and brand favourability among the surveyed senior decision-maker audience.

The 69% ad recall demonstrated that the campaign achieved strong recognition within the Heathrow environment, while the 50% ‘Much More Favourable’ result indicated a positive shift in brand perception among respondents.

The high levels of familiarity and favourability also demonstrate the strength of the firm's existing position among this audience. In a competitive B2B professional services category, maintaining strong brand metrics while generating high campaign recall provided a valuable indication of OOH's role in reinforcing brand presence.

From Measurement to Media Investment

The Brand Lift Study was not simply used as a post-campaign reporting tool. The strength of the results provided evidence that could be used to support further media investment while the wider opportunity was still active.

Following the campaign results, a short-term UK budget shift enabled billups to secure a full takeover across all London Heathrow terminals.

This created a clear link between measurement and media investment: the initial campaign generated evidence of audience impact, which helped unlock additional budget and enabled the brand to significantly increase its presence across Heathrow.

The Impact

The campaign demonstrated how a focused B2B OOH strategy can combine audience targeting, brand measurement and flexible media investment to create value beyond standard exposure metrics.

By placing the campaign within London Heathrow, the activity was designed around a high-value professional audience rather than a broad consumer audience. The accompanying Brand Lift Study then provided evidence of audience response across key brand metrics.

Most importantly, the results had a tangible impact on the media strategy itself. The evidence from the initial activation helped support a short-term budget shift, allowing the campaign to expand into a full Heathrow terminal takeover.

The campaign therefore demonstrated a measurable progression from targeted OOH activation → brand measurement → evidence of impact → increased media investment and scale.

Conclusion

The campaign shows how OOH can be used as a strategic B2B brand-building channel when media placement is aligned with a valuable professional audience and supported by robust measurement.

By combining London Heathrow's business-travel environment with formal Brand Lift research, the B2B professional services firm was able to demonstrate strong campaign recall and positive brand metrics among senior decision-makers.

The subsequent full-terminal Heathrow takeover provided an additional outcome: campaign measurement helped inform investment decisions and enabled the brand to scale its OOH presence when additional budget became available.