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Charter school network · 2024

Cost per inquiry down 80% in two months

Enrollment for a network of charter schools

How we work with schools and childcare →
Lower cost per inquiry in two months
80%
Cost per inquiry, June 2024
$40.36
Inquiries in June 2024
107
Cost per inquiry
April 2024 (18 inquiries)$204.69
June 2024 (107 inquiries)$40.36

The situation

The team runs enrollment for a network of charter schools, region by region. In April 2024, an inquiry cost $204.69, on 18 inquiries for the month.

A conversion here was an inquiry: someone filling out the form on a landing page. Going into 2024, the plan priced leads by region, from $16 to $126 each, and assumed 1 in 10 would enroll. The work sat alongside the in-house team: building and running the ads, and fixing what the ads pointed to.

What was built

  • Google Ads
  • Meta ads
  • Landing pages
  • Monthly reporting
  1. 01

    Google Ads, region by region

    Search campaigns launched one region at a time from January 2024, each with its own budget and its own line in the report.

  2. 02

    A control left running

    In one region the old campaign format stayed live, so the new setup could be measured against it.

  3. 03

    A Meta conversion template

    One conversion-focused Meta campaign template for the winter push.

  4. 04

    Landing page fixes

    Anchor links on the landing pages fixed, with a recorded walkthrough so the team could build the next pages the same way.

  5. 05

    One number, owned

    Cost per inquiry became the number every campaign decision answered to, reported every month.

How it ran

  1. January 2024

    Google search campaigns go live region by region, with one region left on the old format as a control.

  2. February 2024

    A conversion-focused Meta template for the winter push, and more regional Google campaigns switched on.

  3. April to June 2024

    Summer session campaigns run from April 2 to June 30.

From the accounts

Numbers read off the ad, email, CRM and testing screens at the time.

Google Ads, April against June 2024
MetricApril 2024June 2024
Spend$3.68K$4.32K
Impressions3.9K7.8K
Clicks7101.2K
Click-through rate18.1%15.8%
Average cost per click$5.19$3.50
Conversions (inquiries)18107
Conversion rate2.5%8.7%
Cost per inquiry$204.69$40.36

From the monthly Google Ads report.

Conversion rate
April 20242.5%
June 20248.7%

The result

By June 2024, an inquiry cost $40.36, on 107 for the month: 80% cheaper, at nearly six times the volume, on about 17% more spend.

What carries over to your business

  1. 01

    Pick one cost-per-result number and report it every month. Every budget and creative decision answers to it.

  2. 02

    When you launch a new setup, leave one campaign on the old one. You get a clean read on whether the change worked.

  3. 03

    If enrollment is local, run and report campaigns region by region, so a weak region shows up on its own line.

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