The Candleberry® Company’sSecret “Ingredient” to Google Advertising Success

Company Overview

When it comes to developing a strong selling proposition, The Candleberry® Candle Co. has a clear advantage.

“Everyone wants to say they have the strongest candle out there,” explains Creative Director Lisa Clark. “We actually have methods to make the fragrance carry through the whole house.”

Clark would know. She conducted a lot of research to identify what it takes to create premier candles. According to the 25-year-old family business, its product line of scented candles offers consumers the longest-lasting, strongest-smelling candles on the market today. The brand was the first to capture the “bourbon” fragrance, and was an innovator in producing clear-burning candles capable of filling room after room with aroma.

However, the company says it did face one problem — and it was a big one.

The Situation

While fine-tuning an ideal mix of secret ingredients and methods came naturally to Clark and her team, promoting them on Google did not. For years, Candleberry says the brand struggled to get its 320 different candle varieties in front of the right online shoppers.

“We didn’t know what we were doing,” Clark says. “We were attempting to manage our Google Ads on our own. Every six months we’d hire a company…and then we’d find out two to three months later that the people we hired had a ‘set-and-forget’ approach.”

As a result, the brand says it was missing out on a lot of potential customers. So they set out to find the right kind of partner — one with specialized e-commerce expertise and a reliable, hands-on approach to creating high-performing advertising campaigns.

“We needed help understanding data,” Clark recalls. “So we decided to once more take a leap of faith and try to put [our Google Ads] in the hands of someone who knew what they were doing.”

The Solution

When Candleberry partnered with ChannelAdvisor Managed Services for Digital Marketing, Clark says the team discovered a whole new way to increase visibility online. Combining the brand’s product expertise with ChannelAdvisor’s advertising know-how empowered the team to pursue levels of success that had seemed unreachable before.

“We’ve never had someone say ‘let’s get together weekly,’” Clark says of her experience working with a dedicated ChannelAdvisor account manager. “She is so thorough.”

Working together, ChannelAdvisor and Candleberry began to create holistic campaigns with the goal of improving customer acquisition and revenue.

“What I have come to realize is that it takes that whole picture,” Clark says. “It doesn’t just take one thing [like email marketing or a change on the website]. The customers that Google Ads bring in are responding to keywords the team selected together. It’s a well-oiled machine.”

The Results

According to the company, Candleberry has seen a substantial increase in business, and believes that part of that increase can be directly attributed to ChannelAdvisor Managed Services for Digital Advertising. 

At a time when some online sellers watched sales drop in relation to COVID-19 related lockdowns, Candleberry reports that it experienced a surge in sales beginning in March 2020– year-over-year revenue increased 95% during the three-month period from March to June. Orders were up 71%, and return on advertising spend (ROAS) rose 20%.

Clark says she would “absolutely” recommend ChannelAdvisor to other brands and retailers as a result of her experience.

“It’s so worth it,” she says. “I have heard people say that all you have to do is put money into Google Ads, and you’ll get your money right back. Not true. Not true at all. We’ve tried that. However, the rule does work with someone who knows what they’re doing and when you are working closely with them, to make sure they know what you want. Now, for the most part, I can tell ChannelAdvisor to ‘turn the money up’ and see a profit.”

Looking ahead, Clark plans to work with the Managed Services team to prepare for a successful end-of-year holiday shopping season.

“A decade ago, Candleberry didn’t have the customer variety we have today,” she says. “With the help of ChannelAdvisor, we’re bringing in that wider variety of customers who are looking for high-quality candles. This year, we’ll be prepared.”