The client
The client is a travel company offering safari tours across more than 20 African countries. Their tour operators are based throughout Africa; their buyers are almost exclusively international, spanning North America, Europe, Asia, and the Middle East.
The problem
Profitable growth is difficult to find in this space. Leads from international marketplaces are expensive and non-exclusive -- the same lead is sold to multiple operators simultaneously. Organic and paid search deliver a steady flow of enquiries but require constant investment in an increasingly competitive field. Outside of Google Ads, the client's monthly budget for advertising was just $550.
The solution
With a limited budget and no margin for wasted spend, we built a deliberately narrow "cold" audience using Meta's targeting criteria, without expanding it through Advantage+. Keeping the targeting precise was essential - allowing Meta's algorithm to broaden the audience would have diluted the quality signal we were optimising for.
The audience criteria:
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United States location
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Frequent international travellers
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Household income in the top 25%
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Interest in Wildlife Safari or African Safari
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Interest in Adventure Travel
The resulting audience came in well under 500 000 - small by Meta's standards, but exactly the right people. We launched a single mid-funnel campaign optimising for website lead conversions.
The results
After a 6-week learning phase, the campaign delivered consistently improving results:
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Month 1: 6 leads at $92 CPL
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Month 2: 32 leads at $17 CPL
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Month 3: 46 leads at $12 CPL
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Month 4: 55 leads at $10 CPL
The client reported no lead quality concerns relative to their SEO and paid search channels. More than 90% of leads were genuine enquiries, not spam. For context: comparable leads on safari.com, the industry's primary lead marketplace, cost over $50 each - and are sold to multiple operators at the same time.
Next steps
We are currently broadening the audience to account for recent changes to Meta's targeting criteria, while taking care not to trigger a new learning phase. The campaign has reached a productive equilibrium -- strong lead quality, solid volume, and a CPL that comfortably undercuts the marketplace alternative - and we are not in a hurry to disturb it.