In a first for Programmatic DOOH, Holiday Inn partnered with Yahoo and i-media to harness real-time ANPR ad-tech to reach families and business travellers at key moments on their motorway journeys. By combining cutting-edge targeting with contextual placement at motorway service areas (MSAs), the campaign delivered measurable improvements in engagement and brand consideration.
20%
higher CTR at MSAs compared to other channels
3%
increased consideration
4%
uplift in brand trust for Holiday Inn
The Challenge
Holiday Inn wanted to strengthen brand awareness among families and business travellers on the move, positioning itself as the go-to hotel choice for journeys across the UK. The challenge was to connect with these audiences in relevant, real-world moments at contextually important moments.
Motorway service areas provide exactly that opportunity. With millions of families and business travellers stopping for rest breaks on long journeys, MSAs are high-value touchpoints to capture attention. But to deliver true precision, the campaign needed more than contextual placement; it required data-led audience targeting.
The Solution
i-media’s ANPR ad-tech processed real-time data across 18 motorway service areas (MSAs), uncovering audience trends based on vehicle insights and behavioural patterns, triggering advertisements based on vehicle make and models entering MSAs, correlated to be owned by families and business travellers By integrating this intelligence into leading programmatic platforms, advertisers gained the ability to reach high-intent audiences with greater precision.
For Holiday Inn’s “Kids Eat Free” and business traveller campaigns, Yahoo activated Programmatic DOOH (pDOOH) across its omnichannel network, which spans MSAs, rail stations, shopping malls, and supermarkets. The campaign was carefully designed to engage with these audiences travelling on long road trips, placing ads in the most contextually relevant environments.
Motorway service areas played a particularly important role, accounting for 25% of total DOOH impressions. These locations offered a valuable opportunity to connect with these audiences' taking breaks from their journeys, creating the right conditions for brand messaging to land effectively. The application of ANPR technology added a deeper level of contextual relevance for Holiday Inn’s target audience.
The campaign ran in October 2024, serving as a high-impact trial of this new targeting approach and setting the stage for further innovation in programmatic DOOH.
The Results
The campaign demonstrated how Programmatic DOOH, powered by real-time ANPR targeting, can drive both digital performance and brand outcomes.
Display ads that re-targeted audiences first exposed to DOOHat MSAs achieved a 20% higher click-through rate (CTR) compared with theoverall DOOH plan. This uplift proved the value of combining contextualplacements with precision targeting, highlighting MSAs as powerful environmentsfor reaching families in the right moment.
Alongside digital performance, the campaign alsostrengthened brand perception. Post-campaign analysis showed a 4% increase intrust for the Holiday Inn brand and a 3% rise in consideration, confirming thataudiences were not only engaging with the message but also more likely tochoose Holiday Inn in the future.
Building on the success of the MSA trial, Holiday Inn scaled the initiative into a full national campaign in December 2024, extending across both MSAs and the Roadside network. This rollout delivered three times the impressions of the initial test. The results established a new benchmark for Programmatic DOOH, showcasing how data-led targeting can deliver measurable impact at scale.
