How Episcopal School of Jacksonville achieved record-high enrollment
179%
Increase in YOY organic traffic
14
First-page SEO rankings
3.6x
CTR vs. industry standard
We have been working with BroadBased for several years now and they always, always deliver an exceptional product. Working with them is always a great experience. Each member of the staff is very professional, and very receptive and always flexible. An absolute must for digital marketing needs!— Meg Sacks, Director of Marketing
Challenge
As one of the premier independent schools in Northeast Florida, Episcopal School of Jacksonville (ESJ) wanted to showcase everything that makes their institution unique on their new website.
The goal of the campaign was to launch a digital strategy that increases new student leads and ensures that the website design and experience is best-in-class.
The challenge was ESJ has aggressively grown their campuses since 2018 with mergers with two area elementary schools which expanded their footprint throughout Jacksonville. As they’ve grown, they continually require more new students to fill each grade level. Also, their tuition rates are competitive with other independent schools in the market.
Solution
A comprehensive digital campaign was launched to dominate intentional search that included a combination of search engine optimization (SEO) and Google Ads. By increasing ESJ’s presence on the first page of Google for key search terms, we helped them increase traffic and leads for the grade levels they needed to fill.
In addition, we’ve helped them redesign their website to keep pace with the ever-changing world of independent school online experiences, especially as it relates to younger families.
Both new and current students have different needs on the website, and our strategies combine research and analytics with mobile-friendly designs to make sure all bases are covered.
Results
- Record-high enrollment year-over-year
- First-page Google rankings for over a dozen high-value keyword phrases
- Click through and conversion rates that consistently beat education benchmarks
Key Insights
- When mobile traffic exceeds desktop, that means prospects are searching on mobile too. SEO combined with Google Ads will ensure you’re found above your competitors on a smaller screen
- Including an ad group for your competition’s brand names will boost “conquest” clicks, meaning that you can capture prospects that were Googling the competition by name.
- Websites that have a heavy traffic base of existing customers need to be fine-tuned from a design standpoint on a frequent basis. User experience is everything and you need to balance lead gen with serving your existing customers.