Esade, impacting with augmented reality

Recognized for its academic excellence, Esade is one of the leading business schools internationally for its focus on training responsible and committed leaders and entrepreneurs with society. As part of its marketing and communication strategy, Esade has set out to leverage the latest technologies to connect with its target audience and offer an innovative and personalized experience.

Founded in 1958, and part of the Ramon Llull University since 1995, this institution works with a firm commitment to doing things well and generating a positive and significant change in the business field. It has become a global educational benchmark for its academic innovation and social impact through the human quality of the professionals trained there.

Over the years, Esade has managed to create a collaborative ecosystem in which an academic, business, and institutional network has been woven, turning its various campuses into true laboratories of innovation and entrepreneurship.

Augmented reality, the answer to a dual objective

Esade's prestige as an educational entity is undeniable, but its continuous commitment to innovation always leads it to go one step further, seeking ways to remain a reference in innovation. At the same time, nurturing and consolidating the connection with students is essential to convey its values and continue strengthening its success in training the best professionals.

At Runroom, faced with this dual objective presented by Esade, we saw a clear opportunity to translate the brand into the augmented reality environment. In this context, we collaborated with Esade to create a series of augmented reality cards that allow future Esade students to have immediate access to brochures and schedule online appointments with the admissions representative.

Through these augmented reality cards, potential students can directly access all relevant information about the academic offer, scholarship programs, and various student support services. Users can interact with the card contents intuitively and personally. For example, they can watch explanatory videos about the study programs they select, access detailed information about admission requirements, or request an online appointment with the admissions representative.

How we did it

One of the channels Esade uses to contact students is education, training, and orientation fairs where many young people and professionals seek information about educational centers and possible career paths. The Esade staff had identified how complex it sometimes was to convey all the information to visitors at their stands, and this need became the best opportunity to apply augmented reality and accompany Esade in this way:

1. We created an alternative to traditional brochures by transferring the information to the digital plane through augmented reality. Each member of Esade's commercial team has a unique card with a QR code that provides access to a unique URL.
2. Each QR directs the visitor to a web app where they have all the information they need without downloading or installing any application.
3. We generated a back office from which Esade can generate QRs and manage the information of those already created with total autonomy.

For Runroom, it was important that the client could generate the cards through their own manager, so we opted to start from an open-source project that allowed us to develop our own solution. We finally chose MindAR, a JavaScript library specialized in image tracking with direct integration with A-Frame for layout, guaranteeing the performance we needed. These are some of the advantages it offered us according to its GitHub:

• Written in pure JavaScript, end-to-end, from the computer vision engine to the interface.
• Uses GPU (via WebGL) and Web Worker for performance.
• Developer-friendly, easy to set up.

With this, we achieved a 100% web app that required no installation, working directly with any device, thus reducing technological friction and increasing adherence to functionality from any device.

The reality of the results

This project has been a resounding success for Esade. On one hand, the augmented reality cards have allowed the business school to connect with its target audience in an innovative and personalized way, generating a high level of engagement and loyalty. On the other hand, they have contributed to positioning Esade as a leading institution in the use of advanced technologies for communication and marketing.

Another improvement from using these cards has been the increased efficiency in its admission and student selection process. By allowing users to request an online appointment with the admissions representative quickly and easily, the cards have reduced the time and costs associated with admission management, improving the user experience and increasing the school's efficiency.

In short, Runroom's augmented reality cards have been a key tool for Esade to position itself as an innovative institution committed to excellence and user satisfaction.

At Runroom, we enjoy every project we embark on, but we experienced this one as a new opportunity to apply our knowledge and continue exploring extended reality, which combines augmented, virtual, and mixed reality.

For this reason, we also wanted to plant our flag in the Metaverse through Decentraland, the decentralized 3D platform where users from around the world share a virtual world. If you also drop by the Metaverse, don't hesitate to visit us.

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