Business Snapshot Carat Fusion is a full-service interactive agency based in San Francisco, with offices in seven cities across the US, specializing in creative development, search marketing, direct marketing, and web development. Their vast portfolio of clients includes leading international companies in the automotive, travel, finance and pharmaceutical industries.

Why Ingenio Pay Per Call?
Although traditional direct response media (TV, print and direct mail) has long been a mainstay in the corporate marketing mix, many marketers are now realizing that paid search is one of the most effective ways to generate highly targeted customer leads. For Carat Fusion, one of the industry's leading media agencies, driving measurable results is at the top of the priority list for every campaign they manage and execute.

In January 2007, the Carat Fusion Direct Response Group integrated Ingenio Pay Per Call within its portfolio of marketing options. In just a brief amount of time, Ingenio Pay Per Call has allowed their clients to take advantage of a variety of distribution channels, and increased call volume.

Mark Hodor, vice president of Direct Response for Carat Fusion, has found that Ingenio Pay Per Call fulfills a very important role in his client's marketing mix. "Ingenio Pay Per Call is an effective advertising component for a myriad of our clients and should be a part of every traditional offline agency arsenal," Hodor commented.

Hodor has also found Ingenio's product support to be an invaluable asset to the performance of its clients' Pay Per Call programs. "The Ingenio account management team literally holds your hand throughout the set-up and bidding process and gives key insights and recommendations that allow our clients to maximize their call volume throughout their campaign," Hodor continued.

Carat Fusion has incorporated Ingenio Pay Per Call into a variety of its clients' marketing campaigns, including a national chain in the medical industry. To optimize his client's direct response campaign, Hodor worked with the Ingenio account management team to create a Pay Per Call focused program that would reach potential customers actively searching on the web and who would have the propensity to call a business for more information. By using Ingenio Pay Per Call, the client's ad would be displayed in a variety of channels, including Web and mobile search, Internet yellow pages and free directory assistance. As a performance based advertising service, Pay Per Call users only pay for calls received. Carat Fusion launched the new direct response campaign in January 2007.

Campaign Results
In its first quarter implementation, new account acquisition costs from the Pay Per Call campaign were 1/12th the cost comparable DRTV ad campaigns. Based on these strong results, Carat Fusion expanded the campaign which led to a 3x increase in the volume of leads generated and subsequent sales. Carat Fusion's client continues to use Ingenio Pay Per Call today and considers it to be among it's most efficient sources for new customer acquisition.