Cutting cost-per-lead while scaling monthly volume

The situation

A regional used car dealer was scaling ad spend to hit volume targets, but cost-per-lead was climbing just as fast as spend, and slow manual follow-up meant many leads went cold before a salesperson reached them.

What we did

• 1Rebuilt Meta Ads creative and audience targeting around the dealer's actual inventory mix and price bands, cutting spend on audiences that weren't converting
• 2Layered in lookalike and retargeting sequences to bring back buyers who had browsed but not enquired
• 3Automated instant WhatsApp replies and a structured nurture sequence so no enquiry sat unanswered overnight

The result

Cost per verified lead dropped 42% during the engagement, even as monthly lead volume scaled. The instant WhatsApp response was the single biggest driver of that shift, since leads that get a reply within minutes convert at a meaningfully higher rate than ones that wait hours.

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