DMEXCO Learning Journeys

In 2026, the DMEXCO Learning Journeys took trade visitors to real cases on the exhibition floor for the first time. This page explains how the format worked and which journeys took place.

The Learning Journeys 2026 in review

On 23 and 24 September, the first DMEXCO Learning Journeys took place. Our BVDW hosts led small groups of trade visitors from our stand on the Boulevard to exhibitors, who showed a real case from their own work. You will find the journeys that ran further down this page.

Our Flickr gallery shows what the two days looked like. Photos: Tobias Koch or Burmann/City-Press

View the photo gallery

DMEXCO Learning Journeys, September 23 and 24, 2026

In 2026, the Learning Journeys were a new format offered by DMEXCO and the BVDW Academy. Instead of lectures with hundreds of attendees, they offered a personalized learning experience with a maximum of 30 participants. Together, the participants visited a selected exhibitor who used a real-world case study to demonstrate how specific challenges were solved.

The tours were presented and guided by a neutral expert from the BVDW community.

All participants receive a discount of up to 500 EUR on their own Learning Journey at the BVDW Academy.

Your Learning Journey - Your Learning Path

Each Learning Journey is designed to delve deeper into challenges, strategies, and solutions—not as a traditional sales presentation, but as a substantive learning format with real-world relevance.

Each Learning Journey is assigned to one of the seven BVDW Academy learning paths. This means that every journey is not only part of the DMEXCO program but is also embedded in the BVDW Academy’s year-round educational roadmap. The topics thus have a lasting impact beyond the trade show and provide additional context for both exhibitors and attendees.

Find out here which learning paths and topics the 2026 Learning Journeys covered.

Your Available Learning Paths

Digital Leadership

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Data Economy

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Innovation & Tech

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Digital Sustainability

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Cybersecurity

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Digital Marketing

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Digital Leadership

Digital transformation is a leadership responsibility. This Topic Hub shows how leaders prioritize digital initiatives, align teams effectively, and manage transformation in a measurable way.

The learning path ranges from the fundamentals of digital leadership and operational management with KPI logic to the strategic integration into business models and organizations.

The focus is on decision-making under uncertainty, building high-performing teams, clear governance, and scalable implementation of innovation.

The goal is not a better understanding of digitalization—but leadership that turns it into measurable business impact.

Data Economy

Data is only valuable when it is used systematically. This Topic Hub shows how companies translate data into concrete business models, better decisions, and measurable value creation.

The learning path covers the fundamentals of the data economy, the operational implementation of data strategies and use cases, as well as the strategic use of data for innovation and competitive advantage.

The focus is on data strategy, governance, monetization, and building data-driven organizations.

The goal is not more data—but better-used data that creates real business impact.

Innovation & Tech

New technologies only create real value when they are deliberately translated into business models. This topic hub shows how companies systematically identify, evaluate, and implement innovation.

The learning path ranges from technological fundamentals and trends to the development and prioritization of concrete use cases, all the way to the strategic management of innovation initiatives at the organizational level.

The focus is on trend evaluation, prototyping, scaling, and embedding innovation into existing structures.

The goal is no longer innovation at any cost — but targeted, economically relevant implementation of new technologies.

Digital Sustainability

Digital transformation and sustainability go hand in hand. This Topic Hub shows how companies can deliberately use digital technologies to achieve ecological and economic goals at the same time.

The learning path covers the fundamentals of sustainable digitalization, concrete applications and measures in processes and value creation, as well as the strategic embedding of sustainability in business models and organizations.

The focus is on data-driven management, efficient use of resources, and sustainable innovation.

The goal is not ESG communication—but measurable impact through digital solutions.

Cybersecurity

Cybersecurity is no longer just an IT topic, but a business-critical leadership responsibility. This Topic Hub shows how companies can systematically identify, assess, and effectively manage risks.

The learning path covers the fundamentals of modern cybersecurity, operational protection measures, and incident response structures, as well as the strategic embedding of security into processes, products, and organizational structures.

The focus is on risk and compliance management, security by design, and resilience.

The goal is not maximum protection—but a resilient security level that enables innovation and ensures business continuity.

Digital Marketing

Digital marketing today is data-driven, technology-enabled, and an integral part of value creation. This Topic Hub demonstrates how companies can systematically manage and scale their marketing activities.

The learning path covers the fundamentals of modern channels and systems, operational campaign management and performance optimization, as well as the strategic integration of marketing into business models and organizations.

The focus is on data-driven decision-making, efficient channel management, and the use of MarTech.

The goal is no longer just greater reach—but a measurable contribution to business success.

Artificial intelligence is evolving from experimentation to a business-critical capability. This Topic Hub shows how companies can strategically use AI to increase efficiency, automate processes, and unlock new value creation.

The learning path covers the fundamentals of AI and machine learning, practical applications and implementation of use cases, as well as the strategic integration into business models and organizations.

The focus is on selecting relevant use cases, scalable implementation, and governance.

The goal is not AI for its own sake—but its clear, measurable contribution to business success.

The Learning Journeys on September 23

11.00 AM | AudienceProject | Beyond Impressions: Bridging The Gap Between MMM Inputs and Campaign Outputs

A household-name UK retailer uses econometrics to understand marketing ROI and inform its media investment. But when one of its biggest campaigns of the year underperformed following a revised platform mix, the topline results could not explain why.

In this session, AudienceProject will show how cross-media measurement added the audience-level clarity needed to diagnose what was happening across the digital campaign. By looking beyond impressions and ROI to understand reach, frequency, overlap and the incremental contribution of individual platforms, the analysis helped uncover what was behind the underperformance and provided clearer direction for future media investment.

The session will explore how cross-media measurement can complement marketing mix modelling by connecting high-level ROI analysis with the audience behaviour and channel dynamics needed to make more actionable planning and optimisation decisions.

When: Wednesday, September 23, 11:00 AM to 11:30 PM
Language: This journey is held in English, and so is the registration form.

11:30 AM | Readpeak | Good content, great publishers and amazing results

Why the environment decides whether content works, and what quality traffic really means. Real campaigns show how editorial environments shape purchase decisions and how content, context and outcome based buying fit together. If you keep re-prioritising between reach and sales, you will walk out with arguments for quality.

When: Wednesday, September 23, 11:30 AM to 12:00 PM
Language: This journey is held in English, and so is the registration form.

12:00 PM | Optimizely | Next Level E-Mail-Marketing

AI agents are taking over data enrichment, content and testing in email marketing. Optimizely shows what already works today. Real use cases make it visible where agents build communication paths on their own and where a human should stay in control. For you, that means an assessment of which routine in your own setup can go.

When: Wednesday, September 23, 12:00 PM to 12:30 PM
Language: This journey is held in German, as is the registration form.

12:30 PM | Netflix | What We Watch – What Our Streaming Behavior Means for Brands

How do we decide what to stream when there are endless options, platforms, and titles?

Netflix takes you on a journey into the world of streaming—from finding the right title to the viewing experience and brand impact. Because when people have a choice, they pay attention—even during commercial breaks.

You can expect streaming trends, audience insights, and a case study that leveraged both.

When: Wednesday, September 23, 12:30 p.m. to 1:00 p.m.
Language:This journey is held in german, and so is the registration form.

1:00 PM | Media Saturn Marketing | Rethinking Retail Media and Partner Marketing

A retailer opens up its retail media business. At the booth, the talk is about how their own products came about, how partner marketing hangs together with them and what sets the offer apart from other providers. Anyone buying retail media or building a network right now gets the inside view instead of the sales deck.

When: Wednesday, September 23, 1:00 PM to 1:30 PM
Language: This journey is held in German, as is the registration form.

1:30 PM | Pinterest | Creator on Pinterest: Turning Inspiration into Action

Discover how creators on Pinterest can build meaningful and lasting relationships with their audience.

This “Learning Journey” highlights the platform’s unique role in the creator ecosystem: a place where people come with a specific intent and actively seek ideas, products, and inspiration for their next steps.

Participants will learn how to understand Pinterest trends and their audience’s intentions to create high-performing content and build effective brand partnerships. This session offers practical guidance for creators and the teams that support them.

When: Wednesday, September 23, 1:30 p.m. to 2:00 p.m.

Language: This journey is held in German, as is the registration form.

2:00 PM | United Internet Media | Geo-Targeting & Local Commerce

Radius targeting by IP address alongside deterministic postcode data, compared on a retail campaign. The case lays open which data sits behind it, what groundwork was needed and where IP signals get imprecise. Worth a look for everyone who owns local budgets and has only been guessing at their wastage so far.

When: Wednesday, September 23, 2:00 PM to 2:30 PM
Language: This journey is held in German, as is the registration form.

2:30 PM | Idealo | The Intent Gap – Awareness, Performance, or Both: What Differences Are Evident in Click-Out Rates?

Brand and performance teams often pursue different goals and evaluate their work using different metrics. For consumers, however, both disciplines converge in a single purchasing decision.

Using anonymized campaign data, we examine three different approaches: pure awareness campaigns with formats such as Hero and Brand Story; pure performance campaigns with Sponsored Products and Sponsored Product Ads; and campaigns that combine both approaches. The focus is on the question of what differences in click-out behavior can be observed on idealo.de and what these results reveal about the interplay between brand impact, concrete purchase intent, and performance.

The session not only shows which approach achieves the strongest uplift, but also how robust such results are, where the limits of attribution lie, and what conclusions advertisers can draw from this for their campaign planning. The key takeaway is a practical model that links brand and performance goals at the point of decision.

When: Wednesday, September 23, 2:30 p.m. to 3:00 p.m.

Language: This journey is held in German, as is the registration form.

3:00 PM | adsquare | Die „Offline-Blindness“ im Zeitalter der Ergebnisse

Bringing digital ad budgets and visits to physical stores together, from planning to proof. adsquare walks through a complete outcomes loop, meaning planning, audience activation, optimisation and validation, each tied to visits at the point of sale. Which data sources this takes is named at every stage.

When: Wednesday, September 23, 3:00 PM to 3:30 PM
Language: This journey is held in German, as is the registration form.

3:30 PM | SMARKETER | Die „Data-to-Profit“-Pipeline

How Google Analytics becomes a basis for decisions once AI does the maths. The route runs from data through insights and tests to evaluation, without the detour via isolated measures. Use cases show which setups hold up in practice. You leave with a picture of what reporting looks like when decisions can actually rest on it.

When: Wednesday, September 23, 3:30 PM to 4:00 PM
Language: This journey is held in German, as is the registration form.

4:00 PM | JOM Jaschke Operational Media | Ad Fraud & Bot Traffic

Bot traffic and ad fraud in programmatic, across display, video and CTV. How the fraud works and why classic detection runs into its limits is taken apart step by step. You get a clear read on what detection really delivers today. At the end there are three starting points for your own buying: awareness in the team, vetted partners and technical control.

When: Wednesday, September 23, 4:00 PM to 4:30 PM
Language: This journey is held in German, as is the registration form.

4:30 PM | dotSource SE | Warum viele KI-Projekte scheitern

Agentic commerce in everyday work: where AI agents already take hold in shop, content, product data and CRM, and where it is too early. dotSource goes through the four systems one by one and says for each what is relevant in your own company today and which automation brings measurable value at all. The foundation stays the same. Without clean product data, none of it runs.

When: Wednesday, September 23, 4:30 PM to 5:00 PM
Language: This journey is held in German, as is the registration form.

The Learning Journeys on September 24

11:00 AM | eology | Die neue AI-Search-Agenda: Content, Technik und Autorität

Onpage work, technology and authority interlock when brands want to show up in AI answers. eology takes this through a concrete use case, from the technical basics to the question of where digital authority actually comes from. You will see more clearly which parts of your own site need work.

When: Thursday, September 24, 11:00 AM to 11:30 AM
Language: This journey is held in German, as is the registration form.

11:30 AM | Retail Media Alliance | 360° InStore Media. One Journey.

Advertising at the shelf, at the checkout and in the entrance area, and how these touchpoints fit into media planning. A campaign case from the Retail Media Alliance network shows the effect at the point of sale, along with the work on shared standards for reach measurement and bookability. What you can take away is a framework for your own media planning.

When: Thursday, September 24, 11:30 AM to 12:00 PM
Language: This journey is held in German, as is the registration form.

2:00 PM | Pinterest | From Visual Search to Purchase Decisions: How Pinterest Leverages AI, the Taste Graph, and Trends

Participants will learn how Pinterest combines visual search, AI, and the Taste Graph to reach people at key decision-making and planning moments.

Using concrete examples, the session will demonstrate how brands can leverage unbranded discovery, visual inspiration, and predictive trend insights—Pinterest Predicts and Moments—to drive relevant creativity, media planning, and measurable full-funnel impact.

When: Thursday, September 24, 2:00 p.m. to 2:30 p.m.

Language: This journey is held in German, as is the registration form.

Contact

Anne Bochmann

Account Manager Member Service

+49 30 2062186-21

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