Success Story
CIRA Hones Paid Advertising and Wins Big
Canadians rely on CIRA, the Canadian Internet Registration Authority, to make finding, registering and managing domains easy and reliable.
They use paid search advertising to raise awareness of the .CA brand and grow the volume of qualified leads they generate for their Registrar partners who sell .CA domain names across Canada. After years of running short AdWords campaigns that delivered mixed results, they turned to Search Warrant to help them develop a long term paid advertising strategy, supported by annual tactics that optimized results based on measurable goals. Since engaging Search Warrant in 2014 they’ve seen dramatic improvements in lead generation and paid advertising has become a consistently ROI positive investment.
A Master Strategy for Digital Advertising
CIRA had been exploring various digital lead generation strategies for several years. So when Search Warrant was recommended by a trusted communications partner, they reached out for some expert guidance. Search Warrant helped them identify which digital marketing strategies to keep and refine, and which to cancel. They began by developing a strategy to link keywords to analytics so that the effectiveness of various campaigns could be measured against well-defined goals. They were then able to fine-tune keywords and ad copy and refer more qualified prospects to their channel partners.
Year-over-Year Improvement
The results have been remarkable. CIRA has seen year-over-year improvement in qualified lead referral to their Registrar channel that has taken their program into the big leagues. In fact, they beat their paid search goal for fiscal 2017 by over 100%. “With Search Warrant, we’re seeing annual compound improvements that are transforming our performance for the better,” explains Paul Sarkozy, Senior Product Marketing Manager at CIRA. And that has led to more consistent and reliable budgets, allowing them to realize the benefits of sustained, year-round campaigning. Campaigns have gone from trial and error to methodical experiments that have real value in helping them refine their big-picture strategy. “Search Warrant showed us the value of playing a long game. Each campaign informs the next, so the effectiveness improves over time” says Jason Faber, Product Marketing Manager with CIRA.
ROI Positive Results
By developing a long-term master strategy, Search Warrant has turned their paid search efforts into a virtuous circle. Better results help them attract larger and more predictable budgets to run sustained, year-round campaigns, which feeds their understanding of what works and what doesn’t. Search Warrant even built them a custom dashboard for real-time monitoring and custom reporting which gives the program valuable internal visibility with budget-setters.
As part of the long-term strategy, Search Warrant and CIRA worked out the price per lead at which the whole program would become ROI positive, and then drove costs well below that threshold by fine tuning efficiency. In fact, CIRA’s price per lead is now over 22 times lower than it was before they engaged Search Warrant. “That kind of improvement speaks volumes at the end of our fiscal year,“ relates Faber.
With a program that works in place, CIRA has asked Search Warrant to help them expand their paid search efforts into the Bing ad network, and has replicated much of their success with French language campaigns as well, knowing that the investments will be well worth it.
An Award-Winning Campaign
In October, CIRA won 1st place from CENTR for Marketing Campaign Excellence. CENTR is the association of European and Canada country code top-level domain name registries, and the awards are to highlight registry products, teams and people that are making a difference. CIRA’s submission showcased the success of their various campaigns, including Paid Advertising and by winning the award CIRA was recognized for its successful brand awareness and lead generation campaigns in 2017. Watch the submission video CIRA produced.
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FAST FACTS
Clients
CIRA manages the .CA domain on behalf of Canadians, and people looking for a .CA domain name use the organization to find a credible and trusted Registrar. This connection between CIRA and its channel partners is done via lead generation by CIRA. Leads are then passed to our channel partners for fulfillment.
Action Needed
- Turn off ineffective paid AdWords campaigns
- Implement a long-term paid search advertising strategy
- Fine-tune campaigns to drive costs down and ROI up
- Landing page and sales funnel improvements
Results
- Return-on-ad spend is greater than the cost of advertising
- Qualified leads are up over 22 times since engaging Search Warrant
- Budgets are more consistent
- Digital marketing programs are expanding into French keywords and Bing ad network
- Awarded 1st place in the CENTR Awards for Marketing Campaign Excellence
What clients are saying…
Where we get the best results for our efforts is SEO. You have to improve it constantly, but it is a very powerful and honest form of marketing. If you truly have a site that prospects will find useful, Google will reward you.
Allan Wille,
CEO, Klipfolio Inc.
Search Warrant took our existing content and repositioned it for SEO. We just review keywords and discuss priority, and Search Warrant takes it from there. The process works really well.
Brendan Ziolo,
Sipera Systems
Search Warrant helps us ensure that we are using industry-leading techniques…We see Search Warrant as a partner in a very collaborative program. It’s a really valuable relationship.
Cathy Kirkpatrick,
Vice President, Alphabet Creative.
