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How Basler Kantonalbank got young people excited about Stu
Recommendations, app engagement, and word-of-mouth strategically scaled for Gen Z
Initial Situation
The following applies to every bank: Satisfied young customers are crucial for long-term success. For this reason, banks offer programs that combine special conditions for various youth-friendly offers with a digital presence.
Many young customers are also already using the Stu Card at Basler Kantonalbank (BKB). However, the associated app barely played a role in everyday life, which is why BKB wanted to significantly increase the engagement of its youth segment. At the same time, there was the question of whether young people could be activated as multipliers, for example by recommending the Stu product.
With the switch from Stu Card to Stu, which automatically triggers cashback via the debit card, there was an ideal moment to:
- Actively making customers aware of added value
- Collect feedback in a structured way
- Deliberately trigger and test recommendations
Goal
Understanding Incentives
Understand how incentives and discounts influence satisfaction and willingness to recommend
App Downloads
Increasing downloads and active use of the app, where user engagement is not isolated but viewed as part of a holistic ecosystem.
Customer Activation
Learn how young people can be activated as active multipliers and how Word-of-Mouth can be established as a scalable, cross-channel process.
Use of recommendation and feedback solution hypt
BKB relied on hypt's conversational funnel solution to combine feedback, recommendations and activation in a consistent system.
Instead of selective campaign logic, Word-of-Mouth was built as a learning framework:
- Feedback was actively solicited
- Positively minded customers specifically invited to make recommendations
- Intelligently combines app CTAs, competitions and recommendations
hypt was used at six different contact points — both digitally and physically:
- Stu newsletter
- Stu App Banner
- Stu ads in the member print letter
- BKB e-banking banner
- E-banking inbox messages
- Physical BKB special mailing
All touchpoints were evaluated centrally in the dashboard and optimized in real time. For the first time, BKB was able to compare which channels are actually having an impact in the youth segment.
Results
1,432
feedbacks
1,580
recommending users
Over 2,300
triggered recommendations
Key insights
- Word-of-mouth works across channels
As expected, digital touchpoints perform strongly, and physical channels are also surprising. - Traditional mail is more relevant to Gen Z than expected
With a conversion rate of 150.6%, the physical special mailing achieved the highest recommendation dynamics across all touchpoints. While digital content is often consumed fleetingly, physical mail receives significantly more attention. - Competitions reinforce recommendations but are not the only driver
- The most important learning effect: Recommendations must be thought of as a long-term, strategic issue and not as a one-off campaign.
More qualitative insights
- BKB was particularly pleasantly surprised by the high conversion rates.
- The simple handling, easy integration of the solution and the clear dashboard are also convincing.
- Cooperation with the HYPT team is described as uncomplicated, collegial and efficient.
- All touchpoints were successfully used and tested
Conclusion
The pilot not only showed that Word-of-Mouth works in the youth segment, but also how it can be used across the organization.
For BKB, the result was:
- a better understanding of cross-channel engagement in the youth segment
- the insight to actively use positive feedback from the target group as a KPI booster as part of the campaign
- confirmation that recommendations are not a by-product but a strategic growth lever
As a result, WOM was not only measurable, but also anchored as a lasting skill in the organization — exactly where there is a lasting impact.
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