18 Months of Nido’s Montessori Google Ads

Key Highlights

• Increased click-through-rate (CTR) by 30%
• Increase conversion rates by 30%
• Doubled overall conversions
• 13% drop in average cost per click
  

Our Goal

The average overall ad spend for a small to medium-sized business on Google Ads is anywhere from $10,000-$15,000 per year. For many Montessori Schools, this is too much money to invest in something that may or may not work for them. They need assurance, and they need results.

This is why Nido Marketing goes all in.

Our team of Google Ads experts is dedicated to optimizing your ad budget and making sure that all cogs are turning in harmony to result in more conversions for your school.

Our goal is to raise conversion rates, overall conversions, and click-through rates while decreasing the cost per click. This maximizes the budget of our clients, so they see a higher return on their investment.

A Quick Disclaimer

If you want your Google Ads campaigns to work with the utmost efficiency... time is key. 

You are going to hear the word "perseverance" quite a lot when it comes to Google Ads. This is because the Nido Marketing team works methodically, monitoring data each and every week to make sure that their strategies are working for your Montessori school. This results in our clients receiving a high return on investment and increased conversion rates which ultimately means attracting mission appropriate families to your school. Each school is different, so there is no "one size fits all" template here. Each client requires careful attention, unique keywords, and a few personalized tweaks here and there.

Having a successful Google Ads campaign is all about "fine-tuning". It's trial and error, the process of elimination, and close observation, and it has more than paid off for our members. We decided to dive deep and see how our campaign strategies were working for all of our Google Ads clients in one go, and we were astonished by the results!

Just look at the numbers...

Over $190,000 of Ad Spend and 18 Months Later...

We were able to increase our click-through rate (CTR) and conversion rates by 30%. We nearly doubled our overall conversions, and we saw a near 13% drop in our average cost per click!

What does all this mean, and how did we do it? 

First Things First: You Have to Make a Good First Impression

This is where click-through rates come into play. Click through rates represent the number of people who were shown your ad that decided to click on it. This means that your ad spoke to them, and they felt compelled to learn more. This is what digital marketers dream about at night!

The graph above shows all of Nido Marketing's clients' click-through rates through the 18-month-long period. The drop that is seen towards the right represents the early COVID-19 months when families were staying home rather than searching for school options. We saw a sharp increase leading up to the new school year. Despite the peaks and valleys, what you see is an overall increase in click-through rates.

How did we do this?

• We focused on Keywords. Keywords are really important for any Google Ads metric, but especially for click-through rates. You want to make sure your school is popping up to the right searchers. This means really making sure your Quality Score is in check. Having your website optimized with the right keywords is also something that Google takes into consideration when it comes to Quality Score.
  

• Have your testimonials on display. We want to make sure that all schools have well written, and positive testimonials that web browsers can show viewers. This makes a strong first impression and leads them to click and see more of what you have to offer.
  

• Having a good Smart Bidding strategy. Smart Bidding is what determines how Google will automate your ad, whether it is worth being in the top 3 positions for a viewer, or if it should disappear (it isn't worth it for that search term). Having a strong Smart Bidding strategy means making sure your ad pops up when and where it needs to. This draws in the right people and makes sure you don't spend valuable ad money on ads for families that are simply not mission appropriate.
  

• Trial and error. This goes back to the fact that improving your overall click-through rate takes time. Our team tests out different ad types and keywords until they begin to observe positive growth. This means understanding not only the Montessori market as a whole but getting to know what works for each individual client. 

Getting to the Good Stuff: Conversion Rates and Overall Conversions

What you see above is the Conversion rates over this 18 month period. For the most part, the conversion rates are stabilized, with occasional subtle drops or rises. This has to do with the time periods in which people are searching for new schools to enroll their children in. This is why we see a few periodic changes in the line. By September 2020, the overall conversion rate was 7.59%, which is right where we want it for this market, as the average conversion rate for the education industry is between 5 and 6 percent.

The ultimate goal here is to see a steady overall rise. This is why time and patience is so important. Over a period of 18 months, we saw nearly a 30% overall increase in conversion rates amongst all of our Google Ads clients. 

What is the conversion rate? To put it into terms for Montessori Schools, a conversion rate means that someone took an action on your website that could lead them to make a purchase, or for schools, enrolling their child. 

Conversions lead to enrollment, a school’s ultimate goal. This means that all of your Google Ads efforts paid off. This is because conversions represent actions that viewers took in order to lead them deeper into the process of enrollment. What does this look like? Here are some examples:

• A phone call from the number on your website
• Requesting a tour of your school
• Scheduling a meeting with your school
• Sending a question to your school through a questionnaire box, or through a form on your website

So yes, conversions mean just that... you are one step closer to converting them to your Montessori School! This means your keywords worked, your website was optimized, and you had all the right selling points. It is why Nido Marketing does what they do!

We were blown away that we were able to double that number overall for our clients, seeing a 97.50% increase, with 1,835.18 total unique conversions made throughout the 18 month period... and we don't plan to stop there!

How did we increase conversion rates for our clients? There is no one right answer, we approached it with many strategies:

• Tracking, tracking, and more tracking. It is essential to track your conversion rates over time, especially as you make tweaks to your school website and keywords or phrases. This is the best way to see if those changes were a smart move or not. If you aren't tracking conversion rates over time, it will be really difficult to determine if your investment really paid off.
  

• Use specific words for better conversion rates. Oftentimes, we found that specific keywords and phrases improved our conversion rates over more generic keywords. This is where our unique knowledge of the Montessori market really came into play.
  
  
• Maintaining your website to run optimally. The Nido Marketing Team doesn't just take your money and put it into Google Ads. There is a much more in-depth process at play here. The team looks at your website to make sure it has accurate content in order to draw in mission appropriate families. This means having the right terms on your landing page, having testimonials for your school, and much more depending on your specific audience and geographical location.
  
• Improving your CTA's. Our team of Google Ads experts knows exactly what needs to be said in the call to action. This is one of the first impressions that your school will make when someone is searching for schools in their area. If it is well written, it will lead to a click, and eventually a conversion. Think of this as your greatest selling point!

Maximizing Your Budget: How we Save our Clients Money

Online, virtually every market is competitive. It costs money to make sure that your ad is visible. This is why we want to make sure that our ads are visible to the right people.

This means not showing up for everyone.... but showing up for the right families. 

In the graph above, you can see our average cost-per-click.

This means exactly what you think it means...how much each ad "click" cost the client. Nido Marketing aims to make sure that those clicks lead to conversions so that ultimately, ad budgets can be maximized. There has been a steady overall decline in the average cost-per-click, and here is how we did it:

• Lowering our bids. When it comes to Google Ads, there are going to be certain words or phrases that are more competitive than others. Lowering your bid means that your ad will appear lower in the search results, but it will save your campaign money. You can then focus on raising the bids on keywords and terms that you know have proven effective in terms of conversions.
  
• Including long-tail keywords. You are not just a "Montessori School"... perhaps you are a "Montessori School with an English and French Program", or a "Montessori School with an advanced STEM program". Those long-tail keywords are worth investing in over more generic keywords because they will lead to higher CTR's and conversion rates, thus being a better investment for your school.
  

• Close observation. Just like when it comes to measuring any other Google Ads Metric, you have to pay close attention to how your tweaks are working. If you see a spike in your average cost-per-click, then something needs to be corrected. If you observe a decrease in your cost-per-click and an increase in conversions... then you are on the right track!

Conclusion

We found that there is no one magic formula for having a successful Google Ads campaign. The key is to be observant and to be patient. 

We tested our strategies to find ones that worked for each one of our clients. We took multiple factors into consideration, such as school websites, keywords, and phrases, total ad spend, and what ad types would work for each specific client. 

What we observed was a series of methods that worked and led to higher enrollment rates for our clients. We learned that with consistency and perseverance, we could achieve and exceed the goals we set with each client. Nido Marketing will continue to work closely with Montessori schools to make sure they get the exposure that they deserve in their communities, and ultimately, expand the greatness of Montessori around the world.