Case Study: How AI‑Driven Ads Boosted Engagement by 40%
24 August 2025 | Digital Advertising
Recoupl helped a national home improvement franchise boost engagement by 40% using AI-driven
advertising strategies. A Recoupl case study with a national home‑improvement franchise
Executive Summary
A national home‑improvement franchise partnered with Recoupl to modernize its digital advertising with privacy‑safe, AI‑driven targeting and creative optimization. Within eight weeks, the program delivered a 40% increase in engagement (measured as qualified ad interactions and site sessions from paid media) and materially reduced wasted spend. The approach drew on leading practices recommended by global consulting and research firms—using first‑party data, real‑time decisioning, and controlled experimentation to scale relevant experiences (McKinsey, 2021; McKinsey, 2023; Forrester, 2024).
Client Context
- ✔ Industry: Home improvement (franchise model, 300+ territories)
- ✔ Goal: More booked estimates while lowering cost per high‑intent lead
- ✔ Starting point: Fragmented media buying across locations, broad targeting, static creatives, limited use of first‑party data
Market reality: Consumers now expect tailored experiences; companies that get personalization right drive outsized value (McKinsey, 2021). At the same time, leaders are investing heavily in AI—67% of AI decision‑makers plan to increase gen‑AI spending—to power content, targeting, and measurement (Forrester, 2024).
Challenges
- ✔ Low relevance & ad fatigue — Generic messaging across geographies and project types
- ✔ Under‑used first‑party data — CRM and website signals not flowing into media
- ✔ Inconsistent local execution — Variable quality across franchisees
- ✔ Signal loss — Evolving privacy and platform changes reduced third‑party audience performance
What Recoupl Did
1) Built a privacy‑safe data foundation
- ✔ Connected CRM, booking, and web analytics into a clean room environment; created consent‑aware audiences and suppression lists
- ✔ Standardized events (quote requests, gallery views, measurement bookings) to train models
2) Trained propensity & value models
- ✔ Lead‑quality propensity: scores likelihood to book an estimate within 14 days
- ✔ Project‑type propensity: identifies interest in kitchens, bathrooms, exterior upgrades, etc.
- ✔ Value modeling: predicts expected project value to bid more on high‑value prospects
Why it matters: Personalization programs typically drive 10–15% revenue uplift and up to 5–25% depending on execution (McKinsey, 2021). AI accelerates personalization at scale by automating decisions across channels (McKinsey, 2023; Forrester, 2024).
3) Deployed dynamic creative optimization (DCO)
- ✔ Generated modular creative variants (copy, offers, imagery) from a brand‑approved library
- ✔ Assembled ads in real‑time based on context (geo, weather, property type signals, onsite behavior)
4) Orchestrated a smarter channel mix
- ✔ Paid social: Look‑alike + predictive audiences; click‑to‑book and lead‑gen formats
- ✔ Search: Value‑based bidding using Recoupl’s offline conversion signals
- ✔ Programmatic: Contextual and retail media extensions for DIY audiences
- ✔ StatCan segmentation: Used Statistics Canada data to identify target markets, segmenting based on house size and demographics
- ✔ Media by age group: Chose channels aligned to audience age cohorts, ensuring relevance
- ✔ Traditional media (2%): Supported digital with door hangers, direct mail, local radio, and TV spots for brand reinforcement
5) Measured incrementality, not just clicks
- ✔ Geo‑split holdouts across franchise territories
- ✔ Ghost‑bid calibration and matched‑market tests to estimate true lift
- ✔ MMM‑ready data exports for quarterly budget decisions
Results (8‑week pilot, then 12‑week scale‑up)
- ✔ +40% engagement across paid channels (qualified interactions + site sessions from paid clicks vs. baseline)
- ✔ +18% click‑through rate (CTR) in social placements after DCO rollout
- ✔ −22% cost per high‑intent lead (CPL) where value‑based bidding used offline conversions
- ✔ Consistent playbook rolled out to 220 territories in phase 2
AI-Driven Ads Case Study Results — +40% Engagement with Recoupl
Discover how Recoupl helped a national home improvement franchise boost engagement by 40% with AI-driven ads. Key results include +18% CTR, –22% cost per lead, and scalable success across 220 territories.
Benchmarks & external validation: Personalization at scale is linked to meaningful commercial lift (McKinsey, 2021). Firms advancing AI in marketing report improved content velocity and customer engagement (Forrester, 2024).
What Changed for the Franchisee
- ✔ From one‑size‑fits‑all ads to messages tuned to local needs (e.g., “Basement finishing before winter” in cold regions)
- ✔ From media buying by intuition to model‑informed bids and budgets
- ✔ From inconsistent creative to centrally governed, brand‑safe DCO
- ✔ From clicks to incrementality as the KPI
Why It Worked
- ✔ Relevance without creepiness — First‑party signals and contextual cues created helpful, not intrusive, ads (McKinsey, 2021)
- ✔ Closed‑loop learning — Offline conversions fed back into platforms for value‑based bidding (McKinsey, 2023)
- ✔ Operational discipline — Standard data contracts and shared taxonomies across franchise locations (Forrester, 2024)
Implementation Timeline
- ✔ Week 1: Data connectors, consent strategy, event standardization
- ✔ Week 2: Model training (propensity & value), creative atomization
- ✔ Week 3: Controlled launch with holdouts, DCO, value‑based bidding
- ✔ Week 4: Territory‑by‑territory rollout; MMM alignment
What Recoupl Offers Next
- ✔ Always‑on experimentation: Multi‑armed bandits to continuously test offers and formats
- ✔ Creative co‑pilot: On‑brand asset generation with legal/brand guardrails
- ✔ Privacy‑first growth: First‑party data strategy and clean‑room activation
- ✔ Board‑ready reporting: Incrementality dashboards and MMM integration
How to Get Started
- ✔ 30‑minute diagnostic: Identify quick‑win signals and channels
- ✔ 2‑week pilot plan: Territory selection, KPIs, and test design
- ✔ 8‑week pilot: Launch with holdouts; measure true lift; scale what works
Ready to boost engagement by 40%? Book your 2‑week pilot with Recoupl today. Schedule a Pilot → Contact Recoupl: info@recoupl.com