Design Thinking in Performance Marketing

Challenge – To calculate accurately the value of lead prospecting in higher education. Traditionally higher education  digital marketing has been all about leads and follow ups to convert them. The old school thinking goes that cheaper  leads mean more leads and more conversions. This is not a sustainable approach and eventually is a wastage of  monies.

Application - Looking at this wastage of time, effort and monies, I decided to clean up the process and take top  down approach and focus on the main goal which is deposits.

Taking each deposit value into consideration and the amount spent on leads and each stage of the life cycle of the  lead I had to calculate a cost of acquisition (COA). Taking this COA in mind, I then took out data for last 4 years to see  the amount spent on each channel/source and the conversion from them.

Apart from the monies spent on each channel, there are slight deviations in lead follow up in each channel by tele  sales team. While some high converting lead channels take longer to convert and the number of calls and longevity  are also factors that account for operational costs.

So taking in last 4 years average both in terms of spends and operational vs revenue from deposits, I could create a  right mix of sources for the coming session while looking at other factors like geographical resonance, demographic  conversions.

This application of historical data helped me get better conversions, lesser spends and overall better productivity  from the tele sales team.


Design Thinking in Performance Marketing Challenge – To calculate accurately the value of lead prospecting in higher education . Traditionally higher education digital marketing has been all about leads and follow ups to convert them . The old school thinking goes that cheaper leads mean more leads and more conversions . This is not a sustainable approach and eventually is a wastage of monies . Application - Looking at this wastage of time , effort and monies , I decided to clean up the process and take top down approach and focus on the main goal which is deposits . Taking each deposit value into consideration and the amount spent on leads and each stage of the life cycle of the lead I had to calculate a cost of acquisition ( COA ) . Taking this COA in mind , I then took out data for last 4 years to see the amount spent on each channel / source and the conversion from them . Apart from the monies spent on each channel , there are slight deviations in lead follow up in each channel by tele sales team . While some high converting lead channels take longer to convert and the number of calls and longevity are also factors that account for operational costs . So taking in last 4 years average both in terms of spends and operational vs revenue from deposits , I could create a right mix of sources for the coming session while looking at other factors like geographical resonance , demographic conversions . This application of historical data helped me get better conversions , lesser spends and overall better productivity from the tele sales team .