Healthcare & Pharma

473 CRM Leads from 521 Sessions in 2 Days for elmex

elmex staged the elmex sensitive product range at the International Dental Show (IDS) with an UpReach photo booth combined with the well-known elmex dental van as a backdrop. In 2 days, 521 terminal sessions and 473 GDPR-compliant CRM leads were generated — a conversion rate of 90.8%. The lever was the integrated GDPR data gate in the image-download flow, which turned fair interaction into newsletter and marketing contacts.

More than 200 B2B brands from across Europe trust UpReach — from agencies to enterprise corporations.

The initial situation

The IDS in Cologne is the most important international fair for dental products — and the density of stimulus at the venue is correspondingly high. Stand visitors pass hundreds of exhibitors in a few seconds. In this competitive situation, a product range has to create a physical anchor that moves visitors to linger and at the same time carries the brand story.

For elmex sensitive, there was an additional requirement: the brand activation was not just to create attention but to generate qualified B2B contacts from the trade audience — dental practices, wholesalers, international distributors. Standard fair contacts via business-card boxes or lead scanners deliver little engagement depth and barely any opt-in for follow-up communication.

The data pipeline had to run GDPR-compliant — captures only after consent at the terminal, processing secured by a DPA and governed by a defined deletion concept; newsletter consents have to be documented with a timestamp and source, so that marketing automation can follow on in a legally sound way.

The UpReach solution

UpReach deployed an UpReach Compact station, fully wrapped in the elmex corporate design. The setup was placed on the stand in direct sightline to the elmex dental van — the dental van served as a physical backdrop and a visual magnet for passing stand visitors.

The software interface ran fully in the elmex corporate identity: standby screen, operating guidance, overlay selection and preview surface in the brand's design. Visitors could choose between three capture modes — single photo, boomerang or GIF — each with elmex sensitive branding overlays.

The integrated data-request form was built GDPR-compliant: email address as a mandatory field for the image download, a separate opt-in for newsletter and marketing communication. Consent was captured with a timestamp and an IDS source tag.

The evaluation ran through the UpReach cloud dashboard: sessions, conversion rate, output-format distribution and lead volume were visible in real time. elmex could use the captured records directly for targeted newsletter and marketing campaigns following the fair.

Setup & Logistics

Five weeks' lead time: 2 weeks for software configuration (UI in the elmex corporate identity, AI overlay curation for the sensitive product range, GDPR form mapping), 2 weeks for physical preparation (wrapping the Compact station in the elmex design, aligning the stand positioning with the dental van), 1 week for compliance sign-off and final end-to-end tests.

Delivery and set-up at the IDS venue by UpReach technicians the day before the fair. Briefing of the elmex stand staff on the operating logic of the cloud dashboard: live insight into sessions and leads during the fair day, with no manual intervention required.

The data pipeline ran continuously across the 2 fair days with no intervention. After the fair ended, UpReach handed the final CSV export of all captured leads with full opt-in documentation to the elmex marketing team — prepared for direct import into the brand's CRM and newsletter system.

Results by the numbers

521

terminal sessions

473

GDPR-compliant CRM leads

days of fair running time

The conversion rate of 90.8% from terminal session to CRM lead sits well above classic fair-contact rates. The mechanism: anyone who wanted the photo output had to give email consent — the image download was the natural incentive for the data release, not an additional prize draw or discount promise.

All 473 leads were captured with full opt-in documentation: timestamp, IDS source tag, chosen content format, newsletter consent. This data quality allows legally sound follow-up marketing under the GDPR and competition law — a key difference from business-card boxes, whose contact data is usually captured with no documented marketing consent.

The live dashboard in the cloud CMS gave the elmex marketing team real-time transparency over the success of the activation — a data layer that, in classic fair activities, only becomes visible after weeks of business-card collection.

Key takeaways from this setup

High conversion comes from a natural exchange mechanism: anyone who wants the photo gives the email. This direct exchange is more transparent than prize-draw logic and generates higher opt-in rates, because visitors understand the value in return immediately.

A physical backdrop strengthens the activation: the elmex dental van as a backdrop for the photo-booth staging was a key lever — the activation was not a generic photo booth but an experience clearly connected to the elmex brand world. At fairs with iconic brand assets, this combination should be planned strategically.

GDPR documentation is a competitive advantage: standard business-card capture generates legally questionable marketing data. Structured opt-in documentation at the terminal delivers immediately usable CRM records with no subsequent compliance effort — that accelerates post-fair marketing considerably.