SenSource drives 82x more leads with only a 4x increase in Google Ads spend

Since 2002, SenSource has provided industry-leading, state-of-the-art people counting systems. From libraries, to schools, to big retailers, SenSource helps organizations unlock invaluable insights from their foot traffic data.

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We’ve overseen their SEO program for several years. Then in January 2022, we were awarded the opportunity to also manage their Google Ads (SEM), opening the door for a more holistic search strategy for Sensource.

Challenge

Historically, Google Ads drove sales for the client -- but not at a sustainable rate. Moreover, SenSource had yet to tap into a true dual-approach to search, whereby the SEO and SEM campaigns were managed as a collective. For instance, how can Google Ads complement SEO to drive greater overall efficiency (and vice versa)?

Solution

After careful research, we decided to focus on the following:

1. Develop a holistic search strategy. A significant portion of the SEM  budget was spent on keywords with (already) strong organic search results. While this strategy can help safeguard against competitors, our limited budget was better spent on incremental gains via keywords that weren’t ranking as well organically.
2. Eliminate keyword waste. Return on ad spend was hindered by low-performing, oftentimes irrelevant search queries. These were removed to allow for the SEM budget to optimize into top-performing keywords for SenSource.
3. Improve efficiency without sacrificing quality. The account was bidding upwards of $30 per click for many of the core keywords. We tested different bidding models & campaign structures until we found a more efficient formula.
4. Put more emphasis on experimentation. Testing needs to be purposeful above all else, but for perspective, we ran 5 experiments in 2022. The 20+ year old account had no experiment history prior to this.
5. Utilize offline conversion data. We configured the passing of the Google Click ID (GCLID) into their CRM. For any leads marked as highly qualified, we passed that GCLID back into Google Ads.

Outcome

In one year, we increased lead volume by 36x with only a 1.3x increase in spend. This has resulted in a 94% lower cost per acquisition. The values in the Y-axis are redacted for the client's privacy.