About the Partner

This longtime Thruline partner is a private, nonprofit university offering undergraduate, graduate, and doctorate degree programs to students on campus and online.

The Story

The university was an early and prolific adopter of paid search campaigns to drive student enrollment and has seen steady increases in investment and results from this channel over the last decade. This type of campaign maturity can often lead to stable and incremental growth rather than large increases; however, this partner had aggressive new student goals and needed to drive more significant growth from this channel.

The Strategy and Execution

Thruline put together a plan of scaled growth founded in cost-efficiency, to drive inquiry and start increases at a greater scale than the investment increase. The team incorporated new beta opportunities and a greater adoption of audience-driven bidding strategies alongside a fundamental focus on account health and optimization of keyword spending based on start performance.

Results

On an 18% increase in investment, Thruline drove a 21% increase in inquiry volume and a 20% increase in start volume in 2017 vs. 2016.

Takeaways

• A strong foundation of account health, alongside a focus on adoption of new opportunities and strategies, is necessary to drive big gains on mature, established paid search campaigns.
• Lean more heavily on downstream start metrics to drive bidding decisions, which will drive long-term improvements and growth over short-term inquiry gains.