In our last post, we highlighted some of the main reasons why our team loves marketing, as the first part of a three-part series featuring the talk we gave for a marketing class at Pierce College here in the Tacoma, WA area. Today, we’re looking at part two of that talk, which focuses on some real world case studies from our work. Watch the video below or read on to hear our takeaways from these case studies!
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CASE STUDY #1: Jay the Arborist
Jay is an arborist, and he approached us initially because he was having trouble finding new customers effectively. Most of his clientele found him through word of mouth, which greatly limited his reach.
We determined that Google search was a channel that Jay could use to attract new customers if done strategically. The main issue, though, was the word “arborist” itself. Take a moment to answer this question–no Googling, and no reading ahead!
What is an arborist?
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If you had only a vague idea, or even no idea, you’re not alone! “Arborist” is just not a very commonly used word. And we found through using Google Keyword Planner that this was also the case when people were searching for a service to take care of their trees.
By using Keyword Planner and the keyword-identifying process we outline in this post, we were able to find that the keywords “tree service” and “tree removal” had far higher search volumes than “arborist,” making those phrases more relevant for use in SEO. Including these terms on Jay’s website was the best way to take advantage of that search volume to help him reach those potential customers.
CASE STUDY #2: World Vision
In part one we mentioned that World Vision was a customer we were able to work with on some innovative marketing strategies to increase their donor base. We did this through demand generation, or creating a demand for what World Vision offers, namely what they refer to as Child Sponsorship. This is World Vision’s main program, which matches each donor with a particular child in a developing country, and the donor’s sponsorship provides food, shelter, schooling, and basic services for that child.
While child sponsorship is a great and worthwhile program, there are not many people who are going to search Google for “child sponsorship”; it’s not top-of-mind for many people. So our challenge becomes, how do we make it top-of-mind? How do we get the idea of child sponsorship in front of as many people as possible? In other words, how do we create the demand?
The first step was to look at World Vision’s current child sponsor list for demographic trends and data–gender, age, socioeconomic status, etc.–from which we were able to create a “lookalike” audience for social media ad targeting. Going even deeper, based on the existing donor list, we were able to create a lookalike audience based on online behaviors and interests in addition to the demographic data.
Using this highly specific targeting, we are able to reach far more people who are likely to choose child sponsorship, or “qualified leads,” through Facebook ads. We started with a video ad with some educational content about the program, knowing that any users who watched at least 10 seconds of the video are likely already interested. Then, we are able to use the data point of 10-second-video-watchers to target secondary ads, reminding those users of the child sponsorship program once again and focusing more on a call to action.
Once the user has taken the action called for in the ad, such as clicking a lick or filling out a simple form for more information, they can be directed to a landing page with a sponsorship option. Finally, once the new sponsor has signed up, we can keep them engaged and educated through email and text blasts, and encourage them to share World Vision’s social media posts with their friends who may be interested in child sponsorship, coming full circle.
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What do you think of these case studies? Is there anything in these examples that you could see working for you and your business or organization? Or is there anything you have questions about and want to learn more?
We’d love to hear from you! Whether there’s something specific you’re curious about, or you could use some help in your own marketing efforts, give us a call or reach out at [email protected].