The Challenge
Excellence Driving, a prominent RTA-approved driving school in Dubai with over 30 branches and 600+ instructors, specializes in the instruction of light motor vehicles, motorcycles, heavy trucks, and buses. Their growth had been driven predominantly by Search, capturing users already actively looking to convert. While efficient, this approach limited growth to existing demand and provided little visibility into how advertising could influence users earlier in the decision journey. Excellence Driving faced high competition, with more competitors entering the market, making it harder to capture attention and maintain lead volume. Additionally, the business had a high daily lead volume goal, requiring a strategy to scale leads beyond in-market searchers. The challenge was to validate whether Demand Gen could generate leads incrementally on top of existing Search performance, particularly among audiences with lower initial intent, while competing effectively in a crowded market.
The Approach
To overcome these challenges, Excellence Driving partnered with Incubeta to:
- Execute Demand Gen campaigns alongside Search, in order to target users earlier in their decision journey.
- Additionally, a Google Ads Conversion Lift Study was conducted to isolate the causal impact of the Demand Gen strategy.
- Moreover, an analysis of age cohorts was carried out to better understand both scale (high-volume audiences) and incremental influence (the behavioral impact on groups less likely to convert through search alone).
The Outcome
A positive uplift was seen across several key areas:
- Incremental Leads: Demand Gen generated +1,550 incremental leads, increasing total observed leads from 1,290 (control group) to 2,840 (users exposed to Demand Gen ads).
- Statistical Confidence: The lift was confirmed with ≥90% certainty, validating that these leads were caused by Demand Gen exposure.
- Cost Efficiency: Incremental CPA was AED 46.69, demonstrating that Demand Gen effectively created new leads at a competitive cost.
- Audience Insights:
25–34: Naturally the largest source of leads across Search and other existing channels. Demand Gen further amplified this high-performing audience, adding scale to the funnel.
35–44: While not typically a top-performing lead source in Search, this group exhibited the highest relative response (+173% lift), showing that Demand Gen effectively influenced users who would otherwise have lower engagement.
18–24: The least engaged audience in terms of natural search behavior, yet Demand Gen delivered +94% incremental lift, activating users who might not otherwise have discovered or considered the brand.
Business Impact: By influencing both high-intent and previously untapped audiences, Demand Gen created incremental lead opportunities and scaled performance.
