Chefs Academy – Expanding reach and driving enrolments: A performance-based strategy for chefs.
CHALLENGE
South Africa’s leading culinary school sought to diversify its student acquisition strategy beyond traditional search campaigns. Given the highly competitive market, the Chefs Academy needed to explore and implement integrated, performance-based marketing campaigns to drive enrolments effectively. The challenge was to optimise reach, engagement, and conversions while ensuring cost efficiency.
STRATEGY
To leveraged data-driven insights to inform the implementation of performance-based campaigns, thereby driving the client’s KPI:
Data-Driven Strategic Shift:
- While search remained a key pillar, a shift towards performance-based campaign types was necessary to reach users with high intent across various platforms.
- This strategic shift resulted in a planned decrease in search impression share as budget was reallocated across integrated campaigns.
Cross-Channel Performance Optimisation:
- Introduced a channel-agnostic approach to target users based on intent, rather than predefined channels.
- Focused on improving campaign and investment effectiveness, aiming to reduce cost per conversion while increasing overall conversions.
RESULTS
The implemented strategy yielded significant growth across key metrics, significantly boosting student enrolments and marketing efficiency:
Google Ads Performance (2024 vs 2023):
- Interactions increased by 169.4%.
- Conversions increased by 68.8%.
- Cost per Conversion decreased by 23.1%.
Google Analytics Performance (2024 vs 2023):
- Total users increased by 63.5%.
- Conversion Breakdown by Channel:
- Google Ads: 77.1%
- Organic Search: 10.6%
By shifting towards an integrated performance-based strategy, we have successfully expanded its reach, increased conversions, and optimised marketing spend. This case study demonstrates the impact of leveraging data-driven insights to refine marketing efforts and drive tangible business results.
