What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?
This is my fourth full cycle of enrollments while working at this school. This has been the highest number of enrollments that I’ve had in a single cycle. This was the first year that we’ve increased our overall population from end of year to the beginning of the next school year.
There are much higher conversions despite fewer leads coming in. That was one of the problems we had previously while working with other agencies. We’d receive reports outlining all the traffic visiting our site, but it was worthless because zero were contacting us to schedule tours.
Once Noble came into the picture, they fine-tuned the analytics and got the site traffic under control. As a result, the leads became viable. They weren’t spam anymore. They weren’t users who didn’t understand the product, which was another tricky thing when you have a private school. Sometimes people think you’re a charter school or they think that you’re a college. It could be any number of things. Before Noble, it was almost impossible to rectify those issues. Now those improvements have manifested in a higher enrollment and the growth of our overall population. That’s all I can ask for.
How would you compare your experience with Noble Studios to others?
Compared to other agencies I’ve used within my work at the school, the difference is night and day. Our previous agency couldn’t deliver on the KPIs we targeted. They were handling us as a group instead of as an individual school or as a singular client. To them, the client was a group of 10 schools and they figured they could set it and forget it. They would send reports and tell us everything looks great because there’s been an increase in traffic to the site, despite the traffic being useless.
Noble takes a completely different approach. They answer to only me. They’re not concerned about my being a part of a larger account, where they’ve got to spread themselves thin to make sure that they’re sharing their resources. That’s been a huge difference.
Another big difference is that they’re local. They’re in Reno, which is still an airplane flight away, but I get to see my account rep every one or two months, which is important. I’d never met the people in New York City. I couldn’t tell you how many people were even on the old team with those previous agency partners.
How did Noble Studios perform from a project management standpoint?
We communicate primarily by phone and email. I haven’t had a chance to go up to their offices in Reno yet. That’s not for lack of them inviting me to come out; it’s been my own extenuating circumstances.
It’s really effective being able to speak with them whenever necessary. Every month, we have a set meeting to go through all of the data for the month. We review historical data and they propose new ideas. Updates on progress and completed activities are also shared in great detail. Everything covered is sent to us separately for our own records. They keep me plugged into what’s going on what they’re working on, which is important.
What did you find most impressive about them?
Noble is always monitoring site performance and making proactive changes, which completely separates them from other agencies. They’re always fine-tuning.
For example, they’re always running A/B tests and implementing minor tweaks to improve the user experience. There have been other times in which they’ve suggested we spend money proactively because of ad performance, despite knowing how limited our resources are. What’s important is that those suggestions are data-driven, and almost always end up in our favor. That kind of thing is important to us because if we’re going to throw money at campaigns, we need to be reasonably sure about the returns.
Are there any areas they could improve?
No. I tell them not to ever leave me. I’ve worked with marketing agencies long before my time at the school. I understand the environment and working in client-based business. I understand how difficult it is to constantly refresh and introduce new ideas to an account that you’ve had for a good, long while.
If and when you find a capable partner, they can do wonders for a marketing director. Since there aren’t many experts in-house, I absolutely rely on them to guide me down the right path. The fact that they’ve been able to do that for me has been tremendous.
Noble Studios is an advocate of strategic risks and unconventional methods, but the team's wealth of industry knowledge translates to strong recommendations for a wide range of digital services. As a modest-sized firm, they are responsive and offer a personalized experience.