How we did it
Key insight – The path to conversion. It takes time for the most valuable types of loans to be serviced and ultimately “paid out”, and waiting for this to happen would mean we were optimising towards old data. Solving this challenge would be the key to unlock future performance and growth. We took a two pronged approach.
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Measurement & data – offline & online integration
- Freedom Finance has a wealth of conversion data including what stage customers are at in their application as well as their final value. We quickly saw an opportunity to collaborate and surface this information. We identified opportunities where the sales team had particular successes, or issues where we were driving leads that were not going anywhere.
- The step change in performance happened as a result of ingesting this valuable offline data into the ad platforms to further drive results. We identified Search Ads 360 (SA360) as the best solution to facilitate this, working closely with Freedom Finance’s data team to import the data into SA360, so we could then deploy this across both Google Ads and Microsoft Ads.
- With offline data in the platforms, we swiftly combined this with the powerful bid automation options within Search Ads 360. This represented a new level of maturity in how we worked on the account. We started 2020 under difficult market conditions, with optimisation being done manually, and we entered 2021 having offline data at our fingertips in SA360, with bid strategies set up to optimise towards the most effective goal for that campaign (be in target CPA or target ROAS).
- This has also put us ahead of the curve when it comes to third party measurement and cookies. By getting this offline data sync in place, we are well positioned to weather the impact and continue to drive measurable results.
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First party data – maturing our targeting
- Across 2021 we also deepened our approach to first party audiences to go alongside our integrated offline data. We worked to integrate Freedom Finance’s Customer Data Platform into our campaigns. This allowed us to syndicate audiences that had been created from their first party data and get a lot more sophisticated with how we build lists, accounting for factors that are much harder or impossible to set-up with cookie-based lists.
- Once we agreed upon lists to use we syndicated these across into the platforms, which we could then positively target or exclude. This was particularly successful, with the data proving the value in reaching these high value users, or excluding those who are unlikely to drive value.
