Vepple In-Person 2025: Highlights, Takeaways and Snowmen

On Thursday 4 December, we packed out a room with over 60 student recruitment and digital champions for Vepple In-Person and brought everyone together under one roof. Fresh ideas, campus stories, future-thinking conversations, and even a little festive competition…. And dare we mention our Christmas Cracker Icebreaker?

If you missed it (or want to relive it), here are the key moments worth shouting about.

🔮 The Future of Vepple and Where AI Fits In

Did you know 10% of the human race now uses ChatGPT every week? We explored how LLM-powered search is shifting student behaviour and how Vepple holds something quite unique as an experiential platform that can capture audiences in ways website copy can’t. We’ve come up with some clever ways to help make your experience indexable for LLMs; that’s something we’ll cover in more depth down the line, but as Jonny said at Vepple In-Person: 

“We want to work on your behalf to tell the story of your experience.”

🗓️ New Product Features for 2026

We also shared some new additions to make your Vepple experiences go the extra mile. 

Highlights included:

💬 What Students Are Saying About Vepple

We recently shared the story of Jamayla, a 17-year-old student who used Vepple to help her confidently apply to the University of Salford. She talked about narrowing down her open-day options, how her family jumped in to explore with her, and the bits of Vepple that really helped her decision-making.

We also ran a survey across three different university Vepple platforms, asking students a handful of quick questions. Here’s what stood out:

• 75% said the experience made them feel more confident about applying
  
• 58% said a virtual experience like this is “very” or “absolutely” essential to making an informed choice
  
  

And honestly, that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Jamayla’s story and these survey responses show that students expect universities to meet them where they are, give them clarity fast, and help them feel sure about their decisions. Vepple does exactly that, which is why it matters, and why it’s becoming a genuine advantage for universities who want to support future students in the way they now expect.

🤝 Whatuni.com Performance 

We were joined by the team at IDP, sharing an update on how Vepple is performing across Whatuni.com since the launch of our partnership, and let’s just say, the numbers made us smile.

First of all, Camilla King, Director of Client Partnerships, and Jon Montgomerie, Associate Head of Client Success, shared the context around why the partnership needed to happen. 

In their Offer Holder Survey 2025, future students indicated that they are most interested in campus visits, but 30% of them wanted a virtual option, with Londoners more likely to want both options.

So after WhatUni.com rejigged their Content Hub and new Vepple Guided Tours started appearing for our customers, it was time to crunch some numbers.

• +170% time engaging with university content when a Content Hub had a Vepple Guided Tour on (that’s a rise from 1min49 to nearly 5 mins)! 
• Users who have interacted with a Content Hub that features Vepple spend 87% longer on the Whatuni site as a whole
• The conversion rate for a Content Hub with Vepple on is nearly 30%!

This is only the beginning of what we can unlock together and we are all very excited.

🎄 Community Choice Awards … But Make it Festive

Our Community Choice Award brought ☃️energy, friendly rivalry and a surprising amount of Christmas spirit. For finalists and winners (voted for by our community) for each category, see below:

Best Guided Tour

Bath Spa University vs University of Bradford
It was Bath Spa’s fashion Guided Tour that just edged the competition and beat Bradford’s Guided Tour of their gym. Both tours had exceptional use of ambassadors and Content Spots throughout, we’re glad we didn’t have to pick the winner.

Most Innovative Use of Vepple

Imperial College London vs University of Bradford

Bradford won with their sustainability Guided Tour, sharing everything, right down to the campus beehives. Imperial’s Events system still deserves a solid mention though, where they have thought of absolutely everything, from maps to the TfL Journey Planner. 

Biggest Impact Award

Birmingham City University vs Manchester Metropolitan University

Both of these universities have seen incredible impact. MMU has deployed over 340 embeds of various subject Guided Tours to course pages, bringing their Vepple experience front and centre, edging them the win. Meanwhile, BCU could showcase that Vepple accounts for over 10% of their total CRM engagements, which rivals that achieved from other high-touch recruitment events (such as UCAS fairs). A very close second, if you ask us.

Best Use of Student Ambassador Content 

Bath Spa University vs Sheffield Hallam University 

While Sheffield Hallam’s Nursing and Midwifery ambassador, Bethany, is definitely a star, it was Bath Spa’s clever TikTok style ambassador bubbles which captured the community’s attention to take the win.

Best Campaign Integration 

Heriot-Watt vs University of Bradford

University of Bradford took a second award with their Clearing hub, where Vepple became the home for regular themed Huddles throughout Clearing. Heriot-Watt had a truly integrated campaign that oozed beautiful storytelling, and definitely deserved a round of applause, too. 

A Huge Thank You ❤️ 

To everyone who joined us – asked, challenged, shared and explored – thank you.

These events remind us why we do what we do: because the student experience is moving fast, and building it together is where the magic happens.

And if you fancy being in the room for the next one… stay tuned. Something tells us it’s going to be even bigger.

Not had enough? Head over to our Highlights Reel to watch more of the magic unfold.