An honest mid-year review on digital marketing in 2021: The good, the bad and the ugly.
July 1, 2021

Our 2021 post projected the trends we expected in 2021. 6 months later, we’ve seen these trends come to life!

Whilst 2021 may have been more predictable than 2020 (understatement of the year perhaps?), we’ve seen a lot of change occur. There’s been a big shift in the conversations we have with our clients and prospective clients. The landscape has changed significantly, so I’d like to open up about some of the things we are experiencing right now in the hope it gives you insight into the world of digital marketing.

Machine learning optimisation


Over the last six months, we have increased our conversations around machine learning optimisation and return on ad spend (ROAS) optimisation.


A lot of our clients have moved into smart bidding, including bid-to-value optimisation with Google Ads. We are focusing more on the ROAS figures and using this to direct budget planning and strategy.


Whilst 5 or so years ago we would have been hesitant to allow Google to do the bidding for us, the improvements in technology have meant their algorithms to consistently outperform manual bidding. This allows us and the clients to focus on a bigger picture strategy. Whilst they enjoy stronger returns, we are also able to invest further into the campaigns or in other channels depending on their goals.


Verdict: GREAT - Better campaign performance, better returns for our clients!


Everything is becoming more sophisticated


As platforms become more sophisticated, a lot of our clients are becoming more sophisticated in their analysis of trends and how different channels influence their results too. We are providing higher-level support and strategy. There’s less of a focus on the individual numbers like clicks, impressions and conversions on a micro-scale (weekly and monthly) and more of a focus on ROAS and overall brand performance on a macro-scale (quarterly and annually).


Verdict: GREAT - We love having higher-level strategy discussions with our clients!


Consumer privacy effects


Times are a-changin’. Apple iOS14 has been a pivotal moment of 2021 for Facebook Advertisers. The removal of support for third-party cookies will be one of the major events of 2022 for advertisers too.


Apple iOS14 is well and truly here and whilst advertisers had plenty of heads up about this, we’ve noticed a lag in the space with some advertisers not finalising their requirements which has meant their advertising efforts have taken a hit. A lot of the prospective clients we speak to are unsure if they have met the requirements, or unsure how to find out. Having the technology and support team available to get your account compliant is so important if you want to get the best results from your paid advertising. We’re proud to offer guidance every step of the way for our clients.


Verdict: BAD (and sad) - Advertisers need to be able to keep up with these important changes, and small businesses struggle with finding the time or energy to be able to do so as they are juggling so many things already.


Web Design Trends

We’ve noticed an increase in demand for timeless web design. Some of our current projects include redesigning websites that were only built a few years ago but had the look and feel of a site that was decades old. This was affecting their user engagement and opt-in rates. This is why timeless design is crucial for a business - it means you won’t be paying for it down the track with disengaged users or a new website design. 


Having a robust web platform that is adaptable and user friendly is becoming more and more important to our clients. Further, ensuring you have a team to support you with training and the site with ongoing maintenance if needed is another critical aspect of website design that is often overlooked.


One thing that gives us anxiety is seeing client sites built by other agencies with major maintenance issues. If not regularly maintained these issues can wreak havoc on a site when attempting to fix them.


One of our clients’ web team proposed a 3-week time frame to install their Google Analytics tracking code on their site. There are two issues with this; the first is that it shouldn’t take three weeks to install a code on a site, and the second, Google Analytics should have been installed on the site as part of the go-live process.


Verdict - UGLY - This is the disappointing nature of the industry we work in. Whilst we always strive to do the best job possible with the best service, a lot of our clients and prospective clients have been burnt before.



Omnichannel prescence


In line with the increased sophistication, we are seeing from our clients’ in relation to digital marketing, we are seeing an overall increase in their marketing efforts.


Whilst paid advertising has been a central pillar for most of their acquisition strategies, with automation and budget optimisation in place they are able to expand into improving other channels. This might mean a Google Ads client is testing the waters with Facebook Ads. Or a client who has Google and Facebook Ads active is improving the quality of their social media content.


This approach is one of our recommendations for most new clients. Focus on the low hanging fruit first. Get one strategy working for you and once that’s in place, start to look at other opportunities to grow your business through digital marketing.


Verdtic - GOOD - This is why we do what we do! We love getting results for our clients, and it fills us with joy to know that most of our clients are still on board with us 12 months+ down the track engaging in more digital marketing activities! We love being a part of their journey.



Conclusion


These are just a few of the key points that have been significant in our daily work this year. As we about to head into the second half of the year, reflecting on the year so far has helped us realise how far we have come, and that there is also a lot of work to be done. The next six months will be really important for advertisers as we start to plan for the Holiday period. Oh, and is it just us or does each month roll around faster than the last? I’m sure we are in for a huge second half of 2021, so if you’re finding you need some extra support or really want to take your business to the next level, please do reach out to us as soon as possible as our spaces for new clients are limited.



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August 21, 2026
The Client AGA Air Conditioning is a Canberra-based heating and cooling specialist delivering residential and commercial installation, servicing and maintenance across the ACT. AGA had built a strong reputation through quality workmanship, referrals and customer service. What it needed was a digital and acquisition sy stem that matched the standard of the business and its growth ambitions, one built to support serious, sustained investment rather than one-off campaign spend. PupDigital was engaged in a multi-year partnership to bring the website, conversion tracking and paid media strategy together into a single, connected acquisition system. The Challenge AGA was already a trusted local provider, but its website and advertising weren't working together as one system. The site needed to better communicate the quality of the business and give prospective customers a clearer path to enquire. At the same time, the advertising account needed to become far more commercially disciplined. Heating and cooling demand shifts significantly through the year, and customer intent moves quickly between installation, servicing, evaporative cooling and gas heating, each with different commercial value. Residential and commercial enquiries needed to be treated differently, and the business's own capacity to take on work had to be factored into how aggressively the account was scaled. It's the kind of complexity we see all the time working with trades, services, and building and construction businesses. It's genuinely where we do our best work. A broad, static campaign was never going to cut it here. The goal wasn't more traffic, it was a system that turned demand into real, valuable enquiries, built to scale as the business did. Our Strategic Approach 1. Rebuild the Conversion Experience The first priority was improving what happened after someone clicked an ad. PupDigital designed and developed a new website that better reflected AGA's positioning and made its services easier to understand, with: Clearer service pathways for residential and commercial customers Improved mobile usability and more direct calls to action Tighter alignment between ad campaigns and the landing pages they led to Simplified enquiry journeys The website was built as part of the acquisition strategy, not a separate branding exercise. Every campaign needed to send customers to a page that matched their intent and made the next step obvious. 2. Improve the Quality of the Data Better optimisation depends on measuring the right things. PupDigital strengthened conversion tracking across the site and ad account, including enquiry forms and tracked phone calls, and critically, stopped treating every conversion as equal. AGA's feedback made clear that phone calls often represented stronger opportunities than lower-intent web actions. Tracking and optimisation were refined accordingly, shifting the strategy away from simply increasing reported conversions and towards improving the quality of the enquiries being generated, the metric that actually matters to a business owner's bottom line. 3. Structure Campaigns Around Demand and Commercial Value Rather than one broad, always-on campaign, PupDigital structured the account around AGA's core service categories and how demand moved seasonally, giving granular control over which services were promoted, how budget was allocated, and the messaging and landing pages each audience saw. This meant investment could be increased where strong opportunities existed, pulled back where intent was weaker, and kept continuously aligned with the work AGA actually wanted to win, not just the work that was easiest to generate leads for. Scaling Investment With Confidence As performance and enquiry consistency improved, PupDigital progressively scaled AGA's monthly ad investment, growing it 300% over the course of the partnership. This wasn't a case of increasing spend and hoping volume followed. Every scaling decision was informed by conversion performance, search demand, lead quality feedback, seasonal opportunity, and AGA's real capacity to service new work. Growth in ad spend only compounds when the wider system, website, tracking and campaign structure, can convert that investment efficiently. Building that system first is what allowed AGA to keep increasing investment with confidence, rather than second-guessing where the budget was going. The Results Following the website launch in May 2025, AGA's Google Ads performance improved substantially against the preceding period: Conversions up 14% 18.71% conversion rate, a 77% improvement Impressions up 22% Monthly ad investment scaled 300% across the partnership The standout result was conversion rate, not raw traffic volume. The campaigns didn't need to chase the largest possible audience. They became more focused on reaching people actively searching for AGA's services and directing them into a stronger website experience. The result was a materially higher percentage of visitors taking meaningful action, a more efficient acquisition system, not just a busier one. Broader Business Growth: A Harvey Norman Commercial Contract Throughout the partnership, AGA continued expanding its residential and commercial workload, including securing a significant commercial contract with Harvey Norman Commercial, alongside a growing volume of rough-in and fit-off work. 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AGA moved from a fragmented digital setup to one connected system for attracting and converting customers, and gained: A website that reflects the quality and scale of the business Clear visibility over what's actually driving enquiries, not just what's easy to report Granular control over service-specific and seasonal demand Confidence to keep increasing investment because the system converts it efficiently A digital foundation that supported the business's move into larger commercial work This is the throughline in how PupDigital works with trades, services, and building and construction businesses: advertising is never managed in isolation. It's shaped by the type of work a business wants, the enquiries it actually values, and the capacity it has to deliver, because that alignment, not spend for its own sake, is what drives real business growth. 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August 21, 2026
The Client AGA Air Conditioning is a Canberra-based heating and cooling specialist delivering residential and commercial installation, servicing and maintenance across the ACT. AGA had built a strong reputation through quality workmanship, referrals and customer service. What it needed was a digital and acquisition sy stem that matched the standard of the business and its growth ambitions, one built to support serious, sustained investment rather than one-off campaign spend. PupDigital was engaged in a multi-year partnership to bring the website, conversion tracking and paid media strategy together into a single, connected acquisition system. The Challenge AGA was already a trusted local provider, but its website and advertising weren't working together as one system. The site needed to better communicate the quality of the business and give prospective customers a clearer path to enquire. At the same time, the advertising account needed to become far more commercially disciplined. Heating and cooling demand shifts significantly through the year, and customer intent moves quickly between installation, servicing, evaporative cooling and gas heating, each with different commercial value. Residential and commercial enquiries needed to be treated differently, and the business's own capacity to take on work had to be factored into how aggressively the account was scaled. It's the kind of complexity we see all the time working with trades, services, and building and construction businesses. It's genuinely where we do our best work. A broad, static campaign was never going to cut it here. The goal wasn't more traffic, it was a system that turned demand into real, valuable enquiries, built to scale as the business did. Our Strategic Approach 1. Rebuild the Conversion Experience The first priority was improving what happened after someone clicked an ad. PupDigital designed and developed a new website that better reflected AGA's positioning and made its services easier to understand, with: Clearer service pathways for residential and commercial customers Improved mobile usability and more direct calls to action Tighter alignment between ad campaigns and the landing pages they led to Simplified enquiry journeys The website was built as part of the acquisition strategy, not a separate branding exercise. Every campaign needed to send customers to a page that matched their intent and made the next step obvious. 2. Improve the Quality of the Data Better optimisation depends on measuring the right things. PupDigital strengthened conversion tracking across the site and ad account, including enquiry forms and tracked phone calls, and critically, stopped treating every conversion as equal. AGA's feedback made clear that phone calls often represented stronger opportunities than lower-intent web actions. Tracking and optimisation were refined accordingly, shifting the strategy away from simply increasing reported conversions and towards improving the quality of the enquiries being generated, the metric that actually matters to a business owner's bottom line. 3. Structure Campaigns Around Demand and Commercial Value Rather than one broad, always-on campaign, PupDigital structured the account around AGA's core service categories and how demand moved seasonally, giving granular control over which services were promoted, how budget was allocated, and the messaging and landing pages each audience saw. This meant investment could be increased where strong opportunities existed, pulled back where intent was weaker, and kept continuously aligned with the work AGA actually wanted to win, not just the work that was easiest to generate leads for. Scaling Investment With Confidence As performance and enquiry consistency improved, PupDigital progressively scaled AGA's monthly ad investment, growing it 300% over the course of the partnership. This wasn't a case of increasing spend and hoping volume followed. Every scaling decision was informed by conversion performance, search demand, lead quality feedback, seasonal opportunity, and AGA's real capacity to service new work. Growth in ad spend only compounds when the wider system, website, tracking and campaign structure, can convert that investment efficiently. Building that system first is what allowed AGA to keep increasing investment with confidence, rather than second-guessing where the budget was going. The Results Following the website launch in May 2025, AGA's Google Ads performance improved substantially against the preceding period: Conversions up 14% 18.71% conversion rate, a 77% improvement Impressions up 22% Monthly ad investment scaled 300% across the partnership The standout result was conversion rate, not raw traffic volume. The campaigns didn't need to chase the largest possible audience. They became more focused on reaching people actively searching for AGA's services and directing them into a stronger website experience. The result was a materially higher percentage of visitors taking meaningful action, a more efficient acquisition system, not just a busier one. Broader Business Growth: A Harvey Norman Commercial Contract Throughout the partnership, AGA continued expanding its residential and commercial workload, including securing a significant commercial contract with Harvey Norman Commercial, alongside a growing volume of rough-in and fit-off work. Landing a contract like that comes down to the quality of AGA's work and reputation, not an ad campaign in isolation. What it does show is the broader trajectory of the business during our partnership, and the part PupDigital played in making sure AGA's digital presence could keep up with, and represent, that scale of growth. Winning commercial-level work like this means having a website and digital presence that looks and performs the part, and that's what we focused on throughout. The Business Impact The most valuable outcome wasn't any single campaign result or website metric. AGA moved from a fragmented digital setup to one connected system for attracting and converting customers, and gained: A website that reflects the quality and scale of the business Clear visibility over what's actually driving enquiries, not just what's easy to report Granular control over service-specific and seasonal demand Confidence to keep increasing investment because the system converts it efficiently A digital foundation that supported the business's move into larger commercial work This is the throughline in how PupDigital works with trades, services, and building and construction businesses: advertising is never managed in isolation. It's shaped by the type of work a business wants, the enquiries it actually values, and the capacity it has to deliver, because that alignment, not spend for its own sake, is what drives real business growth. Conclusion AGA Air Conditioning shows what's possible when a website, tracking and paid media strategy are treated as one connected system, working together, rather than three separate pieces bolted on side by side. PupDigital's role was never simply to drive more clicks. We rebuilt the customer journey, strengthened measurement around what actually matters, aligned campaigns with seasonal and commercial priorities, and built a structure capable of supporting significantly increased investment, investment AGA could scale with confidence because the underlying system was built to convert it. The result: a 77% improvement in Google Ads conversion rate, a 300% increase in monthly ad investment, and a stronger digital foundation that helped support AGA's move into larger-scale commercial work.
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Futuristic city and garden scene with people outdoors at sunset, blending technology and nature
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