2× enrollment at 69% lower cost per student

2×

Enrollment volume

−69%

Cost per enrolled student

$12M+

Annual acquisition budget

The Situation

A large EdTech platform was spending more than $12M a year acquiring students across a long-consideration enrollment funnel. The marketing team measured success in leads — form fills, inquiries, requests for information.

The problem: nobody could draw a clean line from ad spend to an enrolled, retained student. Cost per lead looked fine. Cost per student was climbing, and no one could say which channels were actually responsible for revenue.

The Approach

Rebuilt attribution around enrollment, not leads

Re-instrumented the funnel so every channel was measured against enrolled-and-retained students — the metric that actually pays the bills — not against form fills.

Re-weighted spend toward revenue-producing channels

Cut the channels that produced cheap leads but no enrollments. Concentrated budget on the sources that consistently converted to enrolled students.

Built a stage-aware nurture system

A long-consideration decision needs sequencing. Mapped content and touchpoints to each decision stage so prospects moved forward instead of going cold.

Installed forecasting and weekly governance

Delivered a model leadership could run themselves: spend in, enrollments out, reviewed on a weekly cadence with clear ownership of the number.

The Results

2×

Enrollment volume on the same budget envelope

−69%

Reduction in cost per enrolled student

100%

Of spend tied to revenue outcomes

Same budget. Roughly double the enrolled students, at a fraction of the per-student cost. More importantly, leadership could finally forecast enrollment from spend with confidence — and defend the number to their board.

“For the first time we could tell our board exactly what every dollar was buying. That changed how we ran the whole business.”

— VP of Growth, EdTech Platform

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