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Wilderness Destinations · Conservation-led safari · 18 months

For Wilderness Destinations, Non-Brand and Awareness enquiries rose 283%. Cost per enquiry fell 20%.

Wilderness Destinations needed paid media to distinguish the enquiries its sales team could close from those it could not. Navvy connected paid search, CRM attribution, weekly sales feedback, and commercial data around that signal.

For Wilderness Destinations · Figures from the eighteen-month engagement
Wilderness Destinations' Non-Brand and Awareness qualified enquiries increased 283% from month one to month eighteen An indexed comparison across the engagement. Month one is shown as 100 and month eighteen as 383. Brand and Brand-Camps activity is excluded.
Monthly Non-Brand + Awareness qualified enquiries, indexed to month one = 100. Requires a Non-Brand-segmented data pull to confirm the exact endpoint.
Client
Wilderness Destinations
Scope
Non-Brand + Awareness
Duration
Eighteen months
Measurement
CRM attribution
About Wilderness Destinations

Wilderness Destinations began in Botswana in 1983 and is now a conservation and hospitality company. Through immersive journeys across Africa, its low-volume, high-value tourism model helps protect wild landscapes, wildlife, and neighbouring communities.

Visit Wilderness Destinations ↗
Thatched lodge suites set within a densely forested hillside
Wilderness Destinations · Conservation-led lodges
A Wilderness Destinations safari vehicle and guests gathered beneath a broad tree in open grassland
Wilderness Destinations · Safari in the field
What changed

Qualified enquiries scaled while cost per enquiry fell.

Across Wilderness Destinations' Non-Brand paid search and Awareness activity built from zero, qualified enquiries rose 283% from month one to month eighteen. Cost per enquiry fell 20% while Non-Brand spend scaled 3.1×.

Qualified enquiriesMonth 1 to month 18
+283%
Cost per enquiryMonth 1 to month 18
−20%
Non-Brand spendAcross the engagement
3.1×
European mid-tier spendSix markets · CPAs 30–50% below US
7.7–13.2×

Client recommendation

Wilderness Destinations
18-month engagement

During his time here, Yoann has been instrumental in driving stellar performance over the last 18 months. He has helped to drive higher lead quality, increased lead volume and a lower cost per lead. We’re very grateful for all his hard work and the positive impact he has had on our performance marketing.

Danny Nagra Danny Nagra Digital Marketing Director Wilderness Destinations
Operating rhythm

Every media decision began with sales.

  1. Work together weekly

    Paid media and sales reviewed which enquiries agents were pursuing, where follow-up stalled, which destinations were emerging, and which qualifiers needed tightening.

  2. Define a qualified lead

    Sales and paid media agreed the signals that separate a viable enquiry from surface-level volume. Nurture paths and exclusions followed the sales team's working rhythm.

  3. Close the attribution loop

    CRM data showed which enquiries became bookings. That booking signal returned to paid media instead of stopping at the form submission.

  4. Bid for commercial value

    Margin context, booking quality, and sales capacity informed bidding. The question changed from whether a form fired to whether sales could close the traveller.

Where growth came from

Better demand, not just more traffic.

Three changes expanded the programme while keeping the commercial signal intact.

Under-served markets

Market segmentation surfaced international demand that mature-market reporting had obscured. Across six European mid-tier markets, spend grew 7.7–13.2× while cost per acquisition remained 30–50% below the US benchmark.

New demand creation

Awareness activity started from a zero baseline with the creative team. Performance improved materially while acquisition cost remained controlled.

Reactivated search inventory

A secondary search channel returned to the plan and began contributing CRM-attributable bookings that were absent in the preceding year.

Evidence over defaults

The platform recommendation changed after scrutiny.

A platform team proposed an automation-heavy configuration and projected a sizeable conversion uplift. Navvy's counter-analysis found a smaller likely gain and a risk of moving beyond Wilderness Destinations' high-value audience. The evidence was shared, and the configuration changed.

Decision path

Recommendation

An automation-heavy setup with a projected uplift.

Counter-analysis

A smaller likely gain and a risk to audience quality.

Decision

The configuration was adjusted without losing the collaborative working relationship.

Context for these results

Wilderness Destinations is named; raw enquiry volumes, absolute media spend, market names, dates, and internal benchmarks remain confidential. The indexed comparison isolates Non-Brand paid search and Awareness; Brand and Brand-Camps activity is excluded. The index-383 endpoint requires confirmation against a Non-Brand-segmented data pull. “Qualified enquiries” follows the client's reporting definition and should not be read as booked revenue or incremental lift. These are historical results from one engagement, not a forecast or guarantee.

A similar brief

Is paid media optimising for the same traveller as sales?

A fit call traces the signal from click to enquiry to booked revenue. Forty-five minutes with the founder. Both sides decide whether a second conversation is useful.

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