We started with our standard discovery process: documentation, research, and stakeholder interviews. This project wasn’t just technical—it was operational.

• Built a full URL inventory across all domains and subdomains, covering ~6000 unique URLs
• Catalogued redirects, chains, and duplicate content
• Conducted keyword research for national + franchise-specific demand
• Created an ideal sitemap and content outlines for the consolidated site

We rebuilt BTDT on WordPress Multisite, with each franchise as a subsite. Instead of subdomains, we mapped them to subfolders (e.g., /san-antonio-bin-rentals/). This helped search engines understand the franchise network and pass E-E-A-T signals across the brand. This approach gave BTDT:

• A centralized CMS with decentralized control (franchises manage their own content)
• A global design system with flexible theme settings for local customization
• A structure that scales smoothly as new franchises launch

Franchise territories are complicated. We worked with BTDT to design a custom dumpster request form that:

• Matches users to the correct franchise based on address
• Suggests the right dumpster size for the project
• Dynamically updates pricing, availability, and required fields
• Ensures leads are routed only to the correct franchise

Not every visitor lands on a franchise page. Many come through blog posts or the corporate homepage. We built a location finder that:

• Lives in the header on desktop and as a sticky modal on mobile
• Lets users search by ZIP/postal code or browse by city
• Automatically routes them to the correct franchise page with local info
• It’s now one of the most-used site features, and reinforces BTDT’s brand promise of being “simple and friendly.”

Managing unique content for 200+ franchises manually would be essentially impossible. We built a Google Sheets + ACF content import system where:

• Each page type had its own sheet
• Each franchise had its own row
• Columns mapped to ACF blocks for structured content (headers, testimonials, FAQs, pricing, etc.)
• Formulas generated URLs and verified addresses

This gave BTDT location-specific, structured content without the copy/paste chaos.

Migrations fail if redirects fail. We spent weeks mapping every single redirect, including franchise subdomains, legacy Canadian and U.S. URLs, vanity links and tracking URLs and merged or closed franchise pages

We implemented the rules in Cloudflare for speed and flexibility. The result? Zero traffic drop.

BTDT’s brand isn’t edgy, it’s approachable. We designed for clarity and accessibility:

• Clean green-on-white palette
• Consistent CTAs: “Request a Dumpster” / “Find Your Location”
• Clear pricing tables with no guesswork
• Flexible, accessible layout blocks tested for WCAG AA compliance

Since most bookings happen on mobile, we designed with a mobile-first lens.

This project worked because BTDT didn’t just hire us—they partnered with us. They were:

• Organized: met deadlines and adapted when needed
• Thoughtful: gave clear, constructive feedback
• Pragmatic: kept franchise needs front and centre
• Kind: even under pressure, they stayed collaborative

We didn’t vanish after launch. We created documentation for content imports, trained BTDT staff on theme settings and territory mappings, monitored data trends and offered SEO recommendations, and helped refine processes for onboarding new franchises

The platform is now self-sustaining and scalable.

• 200+ franchise sites launched under one domain
• Zero traffic drop after migration
• Improved UX on mobile and desktop
• Simplified onboarding for new franchises
• Clearer SEO signals and stronger local rankings

This was one of the most complex migrations we’ve tackled—and one of the most rewarding.

Einstein Moving Company first reached out to us in 2018 to transform their digital presence across multiple Texas markets. They had built a solid reputation serving residential and commercial moves across five Texas locations:

• North Austin
• South Austin
• Dallas
• Houston
• San Antonio

But success brought its own challenges. Their existing website struggled to effectively target multiple locations, their conversion tracking was fragmented across different platforms, and they were losing potential customers to competitors with stronger local search presence. They had originally hired another agency to build their new website, and we were brought in specifically to ensure the new site would be SEO-friendly and that the transition would go smoothly. Our role was supposed to be straightforward: perform a technical audit of the development version and provide feedback to developers so critical SEO elements could be implemented before launch.

Instead, we watched the other agency string our client along for months, ultimately delivering a partly finished website that wasn’t coded well and had a quote form that simply didn’t work. At that point, Einstein Moving Company made the smart decision to cut their losses and asked us to take over the entire project.

This resulted in a complete website rebuild with a sophisticated real-time booking system and comprehensive SEO and Google Ads management. Starting from square one was actually a blessing in disguise—it allowed us to build exactly what they needed without being constrained by poor foundational work.

The collaboration delivered impressive results:

• Site-wide conversion rates jumped from 11.7% to 19.4%
• Organic traffic increased by 35.5% (nearly 9,000 additional users)
• The company achieved 188% growth over three years, earning recognition on the Inc. 5000 list

This partnership demonstrates how strategic digital marketing investments, despite initial challenges with complex integrations, can drive substantial business growth in competitive markets.

Going into this new project phase, we identified several critical requirements their new site needed:

• Custom Visual Identity: The original site and the previous agency’s mockups used generic stock icons. We created custom icons to represent their different services and locations, giving them a unique brand presence that stood out from cookie-cutter competitor sites.
• Trust-Building Elements: Moving companies face a unique challenge. Customers need to feel comfortable inviting strangers into their homes to handle their most valuable possessions. We integrated customer reviews prominently and created detailed team member profiles to put human faces on their brand.
• Mobile-First Design: Despite nearly 40% of their traffic coming from mobile devices, the previous agency had only designed for desktop. We built a truly mobile-responsive experience that worked seamlessly across all devices.
• Individual Service Pages: Their old site had just one generic service page that briefly listed all offerings, making it nearly impossible to rank for specific moving-related keywords. We created dedicated pages for each service type with detailed, SEO-optimized content.

The site launch was delayed due to the complexity of developing a sophisticated quote form system, but the wait was worth it.

However, a beautiful website that ranks well is meaningless if it doesn’t convert visitors into customers. We implemented comprehensive conversion tracking and began systematic testing of form placement, calls-to-action, and user experience elements.

Since launching the new site, we saw the conversion rate of multiple channels improve. Since many of the goals were changed (such as tracking the new booking form vs the individual forms for each location on the old site), we compared the conversion rate of the old site in 2019 vs performance since launch. The site-wide average conversion rate in 2019 was 11.7%—in 2020 the conversion rate of the new site was 19.4%. Below are some stats for specific channels:

• 31% increase in organic traffic since site launch, with a 28% conversion rate
• 84% increase in paid traffic since site launch, with a 17% conversion rate
• 21% increase in all other traffic since site launch, with a 15% conversion rate

With their increased success from our work in the first few years of partnership, they were able to expand their top-quality moving services to even more Texas cities, including:

• Leander
• Fort Worth
• McKinney
• Garland

By early 2022, Einstein Moving Company was ready for their next major milestone: expanding into Florida with a Tampa location. But their current digital infrastructure couldn’t support multi-state operations without cannibalizing their existing Texas traffic.

But successful multi-state expansion meant preparing for the inevitable challenges ahead. The moving industry is particularly brutal during economic downturns. Companies with weak digital foundations often don’t survive slow periods or major disruptions like the pandemic. Einstein Moving Company’s leadership recognized they needed to build a robust digital presence that could weather any storm and capitalize on growth opportunities.

This wasn’t just about adding a few new pages—it required a fundamental restructuring of how the site organized and presented location-specific information.

We spent months planning the new site architecture, developing separate location hubs for Texas and Florida while maintaining a cohesive brand experience. The technical challenge was ensuring Google could understand that they served both states without getting confused about their primary service areas.

The new website launched in April 2022, and honestly, we held our breath for the first few weeks. Website redesigns can be risky—even small changes can sometimes tank organic traffic for months, and we were making fundamental structural changes.

But Google figured it out beautifully. Within two weeks post-launch, we were already seeing impressions for Florida-specific terms like “Tampa movers” and “Florida moving company.” More importantly, the Texas locations didn’t lose ground. In fact, Google Search Console data showed increases in both clicks and impressions across the board.

The client’s reaction? He wanted us to “feel the love” for the new website and told us how “thankful” he was for the results. Those kinds of moments make all the technical complexity worth it—especially knowing we had learned from the earlier false start to build something truly robust.

As Einstein Moving Company’s digital presence grew stronger, we identified another critical opportunity: lead response time and communication preferences. They now had a remote sales team of eight people managing leads across ten locations in two states. Traditional email and phone-based lead management was becoming a bottleneck.

According to Amanda Ware, their Customer Experience Manager, they were looking for “another avenue for our customers to reach us quickly” beyond traditional phone calls.

The moving industry is particularly challenging for lead communication. People researching moves are often busy with work, packing, or coordinating other aspects of their relocation. They might browse a website during lunch breaks or late evenings when calling isn’t convenient. We needed a solution that met customers where they were.

We helped integrate SMS messaging capabilities through Leadferno, implementing text-to-lead widgets directly on their website. This wasn’t just about adding another contact method—it was about creating a more accessible, immediate way for prospects to start conversations about their moves.

The impact was immediate and measurable. SMS messaging proved to be 90 times faster than email for lead responses, and customers who might have bounced from the site without calling were now engaging through text.

We also saw that Leadferno ate into the number of inestimable forms that were submitted and saw the percentage of booked moves start to grow.

One of our most successful, more recent ongoing SEO initiatives was creating dedicated service area pages targeting specific neighborhoods and suburbs within each of their major markets. Instead of just having a “Dallas moving” page, we created pages for specific areas like Plano and Richardson.

These pages, launched throughout 2024, have been conversion goldmines—averaging a 15% conversion rate compared to the site average of around 5-7%. The strategy works because people searching for “Plano movers” or “Richardson moving company” are typically ready to hire someone soon, not just browsing options.

Each service area page included the SMS messaging widget, giving hyper-local prospects an immediate way to connect. The combination of location-specific content and instant communication options proved particularly effective for converting high-intent local searches.

Moving companies live and die by their reputation, so we developed a comprehensive content, reputation, and social strategy focused on building topical authority around moving-related topics.

1. We created guides for different types of moves, packing tips, moving checklists, and location-specific content that helped establish Einstein Moving Company as the go-to resource for moving information.
2. We built out their social media presence, creating and sharing high-quality branded content that showcased their expertise and professionalism. This wasn’t just about vanity metrics—social signals and brand mentions contribute to overall visibility.
3. We helped them develop a systematic approach to requesting reviews from satisfied customers, which has resulted in consistent growth in both the quantity and quality of their Google Business Profile reviews. Since then, we’ve seen almost 800 new reviews across all locations!

When we first took over ads management from the previous agency, there were quick wins we could make right away. We implemented branded negative keywords to ensure that branded searches weren’t showing up in their generic campaigns, which were targeting moving keywords—this way we could control spend on branded searches and have clearer reporting. We also refined their keywords and negative keywords so they’d waste less money on irrelevant terms. (Some of our favourites include the “moving quotes” keyword triggering “moving on quotes” and “howl’s moving castle best quotes” as search terms. )

As they’ve grown as a company, their Google Ads account structure has grown too. We’ve set up both Brand and Moving search campaigns for each of their locations and have created these for each new location when they go live in a new market. By having separate campaigns for each market, we’re able to increase/decrease budgets based on truck and staffing availability for each location.

One challenge has been scaling the budget of our Moving search campaigns, while still ensuring they are profitable. During the slow season, we typically increase the budget, but in 2025, we maintained that ad spend year-round to support their locations as they had more aggressive sales targets. When you increase the budget, you’re telling Google that you want more volume and are willing to compete more aggressively, which typically leads to bidding on less qualified traffic and broader search terms as the platform works to spend that additional budget, often at the expense of efficiency. We worked closely with Einstein to ensure that even though our CPAs were higher, they were still profitable.

We’ve since expanded from purely running search campaigns to also running YouTube ads as well as Display campaigns that target home buying and rental websites. Running awareness campaigns alongside search campaigns provides more touchpoints for people to interact and become familiar with Einstein’s brand. This multi-channel approach creates a cumulative effect—potential customers might first encounter Einstein through a YouTube ad while watching home renovation content, then see a display ad on Realtor.com while browsing listings, and finally search for moving services when they’re ready to book. By the time they reach that high-intent search moment, Einstein is already a familiar, trusted name rather than just another option in the search results.

A growing company means a growing PPC budget and also expanding and testing new channels. We’re now also running Microsoft Ads (search campaigns, focusing on moving keywords) and are starting to test Facebook Ads (with great success!)

Having a multi-channel approach means that we’re able to diversify our lead sources, reduce dependence on any single platform, and optimize budget allocation based on each channel’s performance and cost-effectiveness.

• 300% overall business growth since the beginning of our partnership.
• 15% revenue increase comparing January to July 2024 to the same period in 2025.
• 20% average increase in phone calls year-over-year across all locations.
• Improved website conversion rates through SMS integration and Leadbox widgets.
• 15% average conversion rate on new service area pages.
• Successful multi-state expansion without losing existing market share.
• Streamlined remote team operations, managing leads across 10 locations.
• Strong organic search growth with increased impressions for both branded and non-branded queries.
• Enhanced local visibility through improved Google Business Profile performance.

Not everything goes perfectly, and transparency about challenges is important. For example, managing SEO for nine Texas locations plus their Florida operation requires constant attention to avoid keyword cannibalization between similar markets.

The 2022 data revealed some important lessons about external factors beyond any agency’s control. Despite our strong track record of 37% organic growth in 2020, 52% in 2021, and 30% in 2022, we’ve seen on average 20% growth year-over-year since.

Several external factors contributed to this:

• Economic headwinds, including inflation followed by interest rate hikes, affected the entire moving industry.
• Lack of physical business locations for the new Florida service areas initially limited local search visibility until the Tampa location was established.
• Extreme weather conditions, including freezing, wildfires, hurricanes, and flooding, disrupted normal moving patterns throughout the past few years.

The moving industry is also highly seasonal, which makes year-over-year comparisons tricky during slow periods. We had to develop sophisticated tracking methods to account for seasonal fluctuations and identify genuine growth trends versus normal industry cycles.

Another limitation centered on some unforeseen circumstances with the form on their website. Their custom CRM posed many challenges, and we weren’t able to work from a well-established API. There was a lot of testing and seeing if it worked, which meant there was a lot of going back and forth. This ate up time, and our first, original website project went over budget.

Additionally, the competitive landscape in major Texas markets like Houston and Dallas is intense, with ongoing spam issues in Google Maps results requiring constant vigilance. While we’ve achieved significant growth, this kind of success requires ongoing investment and patience. Now, with the rise in popularity of AI tools and other LLMs, there are even more challenges facing overall organic and paid visibility—but just as many opportunities!

Working with Einstein Moving Company has been a masterclass in collaborative growth. Their leadership team understands that effective digital marketing requires both patience and agility—patience for SEO results to compound over time, and agility to quickly capitalize on new opportunities like SMS messaging.

One of our favorite aspects of this partnership is how data-driven they’ve become. Instead of making decisions based on hunches, they now look at CallRail data, conversion analytics, Leadferno messaging metrics, and seasonal trends to guide their business strategy. When they tell us they want to expand to a new service area, we can immediately pull data on search volume, competition levels, and likely conversion rates.

The SMS integration project was particularly rewarding because it solved multiple problems simultaneously—lead response time, communication preferences, and remote team coordination.

“Working with Full Stacks has been a breath of fresh air from the very beginning. Before we started working with their team, we had cycled through quite a few Marketing/SEO operations. These other companies had always overpromised and under-delivered and rarely seemed to care about developing a relationship or really getting to know/understand our brand.

I can’t say enough good things about this team and feel so lucky to have found them and have the ongoing relationship that we do.” – Cameron Brown

Perhaps most satisfying is seeing them thrive during periods when competitors struggled. During the pandemic, for example, many moving companies saw dramatic revenue drops or went out of business entirely. Einstein Moving Company’s strong digital foundation—combining SEO, strategic paid campaigns, conversion optimization, and modern communication tools—allowed them to maintain growth even during uncertain times.

This isn’t a story with a neat ending because the work continues. We’re constantly testing new conversion optimization strategies, expanding into additional service areas, and adapting to changes in search algorithms and user behavior.

Recent initiatives include support for developing and implementing a video content strategy, improving their online booking form to capture even more leads, exploring opportunities in additional markets, and continuing to develop new strategies to increase visibility and drive bookings across all locations.

The moving industry will always be competitive, but Einstein Moving Company has built the kind of digital foundation that can support sustainable long-term growth. More importantly, they’ve developed the mindset and systems needed to adapt quickly to new challenges and opportunities.

When we began working with RAHF in 2021, the immediate need was clear: manage digital advertising, fix broken tracking, and put reliable systems in place.

Those early projects were hands-on and execution-heavy—creating campaigns, optimizing ad spend, and fixing their tracking. But as the partnership grew, so did the scope of what we were building together.

Over time, our role shifted from just doing the work to also sharing our knowledge. We hosted training sessions for Google Ads, Meta Ads, and LinkedIn Ads, and created guides to help their Digital Strategist become more familiar with each platform. By 2024, the relationship had evolved into a hybrid model: they ran campaigns during quieter periods, and we stepped in for heavier lifts during peak fundraising seasons when they were crunched for time.

Today, the partnership is lighter-touch but still collaborative. By spending less on having an agency do all of the execution, RAHF has redirected funds to hire an additional staff member to support their Digital Strategist. Instead of being spread too thin, they now have the time to focus on implementation and planning—work that they didn’t have time for before due to an overwhelming workload. With monthly check-ins and strategic support from our team, the foundation keeps campaigns on track while steadily building confidence running their digital marketing in-house.

Together, these successes show the impact of investing in both trackable results—such as event registrations and donations—and in building RAHF’s long-term capacity as an organization. By creating processes, improving tracking, and training staff, the foundation is better equipped to run effective digital campaigns on its own, adapt to change, and sustain growth well into the future.

Increasing Event Attendance

Between Us (previously known as What The Health) is a free interactive lecture series that the Lois Hole Hospital for Women’s Society puts on in partnership with Alberta Blue Cross. Each month, health experts discuss women’s health topics ranging from maternal mental health to perimenopause.

Before working with us, they didn’t get a lot of people registering for the event—the events simply weren’t reaching enough of the right people. To change that, we ran two types of Facebook campaigns: one optimized for conversions (registrations on their website) and another for event responses (directly through Facebook). By optimizing for the specific action we wanted people to take—not just link clicks—we gave the algorithm a clearer signal, and it delivered.

The results? Attendance skyrocketed! We loved getting emails like this:

“Mini update on March’s Between Us event: We raised $770 in donations and had 781 registrants with 382 attendees! This is the HIGHEST number of registrants we’ve ever had.“

and this:

“This event had the highest number of registrants we’ve ever seen! We’ve never had this many people register for an event before. In fact, it was so high that we had to expand our Zoom capacity.”

Because the series is free, with an option to donate, it removes a key barrier to participation while still supporting the cause. It’s a win-win: the community gains access to valuable women’s health education, and LHHWS connects with new potential donors who may support future initiatives.

Building a Smarter Foundation: Strategy, Tracking, and Budget Alignment

Over time, we built a shared planning rhythm—forecasting campaign budgets while staying flexible—and learned the ins and outs of RAHF. As we understood their business cadence, collaboration got easier and faster: fewer iterations, quicker approvals, and smoother launches.

But none of that matters without reliable data. When we started working with RAHF, the ownership of their GTM container and ad accounts were scattered across multiple people and agencies. That was one of the first things we helped them work on, to make sure that they had ownership and access to all of their accounts. There was also a disconnect in their Google Analytics implementation between their website and donation pages, which live on a subdomain. While tracking is never going to be perfect (even though we really wish it could be), we created an analytics plan, implemented more robust conversion tracking, and built dashboards so they could easily track KPIs that were important to them.

Thanks to clearer, more accurate campaign reporting, the marketing team at RAHF has the information they need to make strategic budget decisions.

Insights to Action: How We Evolved Our Strategy

Our partnership with RAHF wasn’t about following a playbook. It was about continuous testing, learning, and adapting. Here’s a few examples of how we refined our approach based on real performance data:

1. Platform Testing & Optimization: Different platforms work better for different types of campaigns, and we’re always willing to test to find what delivers the best results. For events like Between Us, Harvest Celebration, and the Lois Hole Women’s Society’s Bid and Benefit we tried multiple Google Ads campaign approaches but weren’t able to match or get close to Meta’s results, so we stopped putting budget towards Google Ads and focused our efforts on Meta. The result? Reduced ad spend with similar (or better) results!
2. Navigating Giving Tuesday: The week leading up to Giving Tuesday is an incredibly competitive time for charities, but timing matters more than duration. Over the years, we’ve learned that donor behavior is concentrated. The majority of donations happen on Giving Tuesday itself, not in the days leading up to it. You can’t artificially extend a moment-in-time event; people donate when they’re ready, and for Giving Tuesday, that’s the day itself. Focusing on awareness and showcasing the impact your organization has before Giving Tuesday is great so you’re top-of-mind, but putting budget behind the donation ask is best saved for Giving Tuesday itself. The result? 2024 saw their highest donations yet from Meta Ads!
3. Optimizing for Quality Traffic: Optimizing for the end goal you want users to take after they click on your Facebook Ad makes sense. If you want more donations, you should optimize for donations. Right? However, if not enough people are taking action (donating) then you starve the algorithm of data and your campaigns perform poorly because they can’t make it out of the learning phase. We recommended optimizing for an earlier “conversion” called Quality Traffic (based on time spent on page and scroll depth) so we could give Facebook enough data to successfully optimize our ads to show to an engaged audience, instead of starving the algorithm.

This helped to feed our remarketing audiences, allowing RAHF to re-engage with people who’ve shown genuine interest in their cause.

Expanding Their Reach

Microsoft Ads

We helped RAHF activate Microsoft Ads for Social Impact, unlocking in‑kind ad credits (similar to Google Ad Grants) which allowed them to expand their reach at no cost to their paid media budget. We handled enrollment and policy compliance, built grant‑only campaigns with dedicated tracking, and set simple guardrails so the grant can run “always on” while cash budgets stay focused on the most conversion‑efficient campaigns.

(Sidenote: Unfortunately, Microsoft Ads is sunsetting this program. We’re sad to see it go!)

We were able to achieve steady impression growth. Conversions (especially donations), are very seasonal, with year end being the busiest time. The big spike in the image above was an anomaly quarter with higher than average conversion rates for non-donation conversion actions.

Google Ads & Ad Grants

What started as search-focused campaigns evolved into a multi-format Google Ads strategy, testing Performance Max, Demand Gen, and Video. This wasn’t about chasing every new feature; rather, it was about meeting RAHF’s audience where they are. Many initiatives lacked the search volume to support Search campaigns, so we leveraged alternative targeting methods and ad formats to find new ways to engage.

Like many non-profits, RAHF struggled to see meaningful results from their Google Ad Grants account. Their keywords were either too broad (and therefore irrelevant to their organization) or too specific to see any search volume. Add on minimal, untrustworthy conversion tracking and it was not surprising that the account was not delivering any real value. We rebuilt their grants account from the ground up: implementing proper conversion tracking, restructuring campaigns with targeted keywords, writing compelling ad copy, and ensuring ongoing policy compliance.

The arrow on this chart shows when we took over the account. By improving conversion tracking, managing compliance issues, and improving keyword relevancy, we were able to see a drastic increase in conversions, while keeping traffic to the website at similar levels. Their Ad Grants account became a valuable awareness tool that runs year-round without touching their paid media budget.

LinkedIn Ads

In 2022, we added LinkedIn Ads to RAHF’s strategy, focusing on two key campaigns: year-end giving and their annual report. Unlike Meta or Google, LinkedIn gave us direct access to healthcare professionals and decision-makers—audiences deeply invested in healthcare innovation. It was also another channel that we could leverage remarketing to nurture people to donate. By reserving LinkedIn for these strategic campaigns rather than using it year-round, we maximized budget efficiency while reaching quality audiences who care about RAHF’s mission and impact.

Supporting the Full Donor Journey

When RAHF first approached us, they wanted to increase online donations by 5% each year (25% in 5 years), and later expressed that they thought they could increase that by 10% each year (50% in 5 years)!

Despite having this goal, a lot of the campaigns that were planned weren’t focused on generating online donations. We primarily ran campaigns to raise awareness for their causes such as women’s health, vision health, and heart health, as well as campaigns to showcase and educate Albertans how their donations were being used (via their annual report). We also ran campaigns to support their different initiatives, such as promoting surveys for AWHF to support the creation of their thought leadership reports (Surveying the Silence and Shining the Light).

Can all of these things support online giving? Absolutely! But while online giving metrics only capture one part of donor behavior, our campaigns supported the entire donor journey. Someone who engaged with our awareness campaigns might later:

• Attend Harvest Celebration (event revenue)
• Purchase Full House Lottery tickets (lottery revenue)
• Make a legacy commitment (planned giving)
• Encourage their employer to become a corporate sponsor (corporate support)
• Donate after receiving a letter in the mail (direct mail)

These things aren’t online donations, but they are still important actions!

Where we found the most success with increasing online donations was through remarketing campaigns and brand campaigns, as these people are already familiar with the foundation. While we did run campaigns focused on generating donations, they often weren’t successful due to it being a big ask for a cold audience and the highly competitive nature of charitable giving in Alberta.

Asking someone who has never heard of RAHF to immediately donate $50, $100, or more is an enormous ask. Unlike e-commerce where someone might impulse-buy a $30 product, charitable donations require:

• Trust in the organization
• Understanding of the cause and impact
• Emotional connection to the mission
• Financial capacity and willingness to give
• Confidence that their donation will be used effectively

This is why direct donation campaigns to cold audiences typically see low conversion rates and high cost-per-acquisition, often making them financially unsustainable for charitable organizations with limited marketing budgets. Nurturing these audiences first through awareness campaigns, then converting them through remarketing, proved far more effective and sustainable.

We didn’t meet RAHF’s original online donation goals, but we did build something more sustainable—we built awareness and trust that supported RAHF’s entire fundraising ecosystem during one of the most challenging periods in charitable sector history. (Thanks, COVID!) Online giving gift volume is back to pre-pandemic levels and online gift income has seen a 44% increase year over year (it’s worth noting that the Canada Post strike likely played a role in this as more donors shifted to giving online).

According to their 2024 annual report, “the foundation has achieved an impressive feat of doubling the fundraising net revenues.” This is the growth that matters!

One of RAHF’s long-term goals was to manage their digital advertising in-house. To get there, they needed someone on their team trained on Facebook, Google, and LinkedIn Ads—but learning on your own is challenging. With countless resources available and platforms constantly evolving (new features, algorithm updates, deprecated tools), it’s hard to know where to start or how to adapt. (That’s why Full Stacks offers training!)

When we began training RAHF’s Digital Strategist in 2022, they didn’t have bandwidth to immediately take over all of their campaigns, but they wanted to start learning and develop an ads mindset. We began with Facebook Ads: multiple one-on-one training sessions via Zoom covering campaign types, settings, audiences, ad creation, and key metrics. We also provided a written guide they could reference later alongside video recordings of the training sessions.

But we didn’t just train and disappear. Because platforms change constantly, we built in ongoing support: monthly check-ins to answer questions, share relevant updates, and explain how those changes would impact RAHF’s campaigns or create new opportunities.

Training later expanded to include Google Ads and LinkedIn Ads. The progression was gradual but intentional so they weren’t overwhelmed. They started by observing our campaign setups, then moved to co-creating campaigns with our guidance, and eventually to planning and launching campaigns independently during quieter fundraising periods. When peak seasons hit (typically Q3/Q4) we’d step back in to handle the heavier execution while they focused on their main role of managing social media for the foundation. We also provided Google Analytics 4 training to help them understand their data across all online channels, not just ads.

In 2025, RAHF hired a second team member to support their Digital Strategist, finally giving them capacity to work on ads full-time. Now, instead of being stretched too thin, they have time for the strategic planning and implementation work that was impossible before. Our role has evolved into monthly reviews: they bring questions, we troubleshoot together, and we keep building confidence.

The result? RAHF now has sustainable in-house capability. They’re not dependent on an agency for every campaign launch. When we review their campaigns, there are less mistakes (such as settings missed or no UTM tracking added). Questions are shifting from “how do I set this up?” to “which approach will work better for this campaign?”. There is still room to grow, but we’re so proud of the growth we’ve seen!

We love that the foundation invested in developing their team’s skills and then brought on additional staff to support them. Redirecting agency budgets toward building internal capacity is exactly the kind of long-term investment that pays off year after year.

“It’s been a pleasure working with Brittany, Sammy, and Dana over the past three years. I’ve learned so much from their training on Google, Facebook, Microsoft, and LinkedIn ads, as well as their guidance and support while I transitioned into managing the paid side and expanding my knowledge in GTM and Google Analytics. I’m truly grateful for everything they’ve done to set RAHF up for success and ensure we can confidently handle things on our own. It’s been wonderful learning from them, and I deeply appreciate all the support they’ve provided along the way.” — Rebecca Han, Lead, Digital Strategist

Like many non-profit organizations, RAHF operates in a world of big goals, limited resources, and constant change. That reality shaped some of the challenges we faced together:

• Technical constraints: Donation platforms used in the nonprofit sector often use iframes and other tracking-unfriendly options, making it difficult to track more than the basics.
• Timeline pressure: With a small team juggling multiple brands and events, things don’t always move at the speed of digital. Campaigns often faced delays due to waiting for new donation pages to be created, creative content from another agency, or internal approvals.
• Ad platform sensitivities: Because healthcare fundraising touches on social issues, ads were occasionally flagged or disapproved. While not constant, it created extra steps to get campaigns live and meant that if a campaign was flagged for social issues we couldn’t use certain features, such as Advantage+ audiences on Facebook.
• Ownership gaps: Early on, access and ownership of critical assets—like their Meta pixel and domain verification—wasn’t owned by RAHF but by another agency they previously worked with. It took time (and some sleuthing) to gather all their assets. We always recommend that clients have ownership of their own accounts (analytics, ads) and other assets!
• Constant platform changes: Shifts in how platforms like Facebook (pixel changes, core event setup, Advantage+) and Google Ads (audience eligibility changes, PMAX, healthcare policy updates) work meant ongoing adaptation was required to keep campaigns compliant and effective.
• Shifting teams and priorities: Staff turnover is a fact of life in non-profits, and each change can mean campaigns pause, evergreen efforts lose momentum, or new initiatives get delayed.
• Risk appetite: Trying new approaches (like Facebook for Nonprofits) can feel daunting when every dollar counts, which makes nonprofits naturally more cautious about experimentation.
• Donor fatigue & external context: Economic uncertainty, healthcare strain in Alberta, and donor fatigue during/after the pandemic made it harder to hit aggressive fundraising targets.
• Competing priorities: With so many campaigns across multiple brands (RAHF, AWHF, and LHHWS) there was sometimes a challenge in deciding which initiative should get priority digital spend and focus.
• Resource constraints: Like many nonprofits, RAHF operates with lean teams and tight budgets. Video content was particularly challenging as producing quality videos requires time, equipment, and expertise that weren’t always available. We worked with what existed or got creative with simpler formats, even when we knew video could drive stronger results.

These aren’t unusual hurdles—they’re the everyday realities of digital marketing in the non-profit world. What matters is building the flexibility to work through them, and that’s what kept this partnership moving forward.

Looking back on four years of collaboration, a few things stand out as the foundations of what made this partnership successful.

We stayed flexible as their needs evolved. What started as hands-on campaign management naturally shifted into training, then coaching, and now strategic support. We adapted as RAHF’s capacity grew and their priorities changed. That meant being willing to step back and celebrate when they didn’t need us as much anymore.

Honest communication kept us aligned. When campaigns didn’t perform, we said so. When their goals felt unrealistic given external challenges (donor fatigue, competitive landscape), we had those conversations. And when they had capacity constraints that would delay work, they told us. That transparency made it possible to navigate challenges without blame or frustration.

The real success isn’t just the campaigns we’ve launched—it’s how the foundation has grown its own capacity along the way. That journey from “do it for us” to “do it with us” to “doing it ourselves, with you as a sounding board” has become the hallmark of our work together.

Just Mind Counseling wasn’t experiencing the typical struggles you might expect from a startup. William had done his homework over the years, building quality backlinks, creating substantial blog content, and developing a strong team of experienced therapists averaging over 10+ years of experience.

They were converting 40% of leads who contacted them—an impressive rate in the therapy industry. The practice had carved out expertise in niche areas like Autism, ADHD, PTSD, EMDR, child counseling, and marriage counseling, with 13 EMDR-certified therapists on staff.

But the competitive landscape was shifting dramatically. Deep Eddy Psychotherapy had grown from 30 therapists in 3 locations to 220 therapists across 12 locations in multiple cities with venture capital backing. Health tech companies like Sondermind and Headway were disrupting the market by securing better insurance rates. Therapy Austin had 150 cash-pay providers across 6 locations. Meanwhile, Just Mind Counseling’s primarily cash-pay model (sessions ranging from $135-205) was feeling pressure as clients became more cost-conscious.

“We need to continue to increase our lead generation,” William told us during discovery. “Our primary business goal is to keep our lead volume high and with good quality leads while maintaining the quality of our services, despite our size.”

Our discovery process revealed several critical issues hiding beneath Just Mind Counseling’s surface. We uncovered problems from large tracking issues to overall friction in their user experience.

Their appointment booking process was a conversion blocker: a lengthy five-step form with extensive required fields that only 25% of users completed. Another area of friction we found: if you clicked “Make An Appointment” from individual therapist pages, it led to the same generic form with no way to actually book with that specific therapist.

We also found some foundational SEO issues that were hampering their organic visibility:

• Poor meta descriptions with grammatical errors
• Incorrect schema markup across therapist and service pages
• Internal links pointing to redirected or broken URLs
• Unnecessary date-based archives creating duplicate content

Lastly, their Google Ads account showed promise but lacked strategic structure, with all keywords lumped into broad campaigns rather than being organized by specific issues or treatment methods.

January – March 2023: Immediate fixes and strategic planning

Our first priority was addressing the Google Analytics and tracking issues. We worked with their developer to fix URL issues and began the process of cleaning up their analytics implementation.

Next, we tackled the low-hanging fruit that would have an immediate impact, including:

• Optimized title tags and meta descriptions for their three main service pages (EMDR, Online Counseling, and Psychological Testing)
• Set up proper CallRail integration for better phone tracking
• Began comprehensive keyword research to inform content strategy

The navigation overhaul was crucial. We recommended a mega-menu structure that would surface all their counseling services instead of burying them on secondary pages. We also made sure their phone number and “Make An Appointment” button were prominent in the navigation—after all, William mentioned they were getting better results from phone calls than web leads.

April – August 2023: Building authority and fixing foundations

With priority issues addressed, we began the deeper work of content optimization and technical cleanup. Our content audit revealed significant cannibalization issues: they had multiple blog posts and pages competing against each other for the same topics. For example, they had a three-part blog series on “Prescriptions” where only the third part was getting any traffic.

The service page optimizations were methodical and data-driven. We created detailed recommendations for their top counseling services, ensuring each page targeted specific, relevant keywords rather than trying to be everything to everyone. The anxiety and depression pages were particular priorities, given their popularity and conversion potential.

Meanwhile, we addressed their Google Business Profile issues:

• Fixed UTM tracking (they were using inconsistent capitalization that was splitting their analytics data)
• Improved post linking strategy (almost every post was linking to the homepage instead of relevant content)
• Added FAQ sections to profiles that were missing them
• Removed stock photos in favor of authentic company images

September 2023 – March 2024: Strategic content expansion

As competition intensified, we focused on areas where Just Mind Counseling could differentiate themselves. William was particularly concerned about competitors’ rapid expansion and their positioning around being “hyper local” despite most being private equity ownership. Our response was to lean into Just Mind Counseling’s authentic local connections and expertise.

We developed content around emerging opportunities William identified:

• Body Image and Food Issues Counseling (new service area)
• Enhanced ADHD and EMDR content (areas of growing demand)
• Parenting aging parents content (partnership opportunity with retired news anchors)

The blog audit revealed gold mines of underperforming content. Posts that were bringing in significant traffic weren’t converting because they lacked calls-to-action and internal linking to relevant services. We systematically began providing updated high-traffic post content to include strategic CTAs and better funnel readers toward appointment booking.

The multi-location visibility problem

Service area expansion was another focus, but it revealed a critical issue hiding in plain sight. Despite having two Austin locations 9.2 miles apart, only the original Spicewood Springs location was appearing in branded search results. The Westlake location, which opened in 2022, remained invisible even after 8+ months, a frustrating problem that persisted despite William following all the standard Google Business Profile best practices.

“Getting both locations to appear in Google was a royal pain—and Full Stacks helped make that complicated process happen.” — William Schroeder

This wasn’t just an SEO technicality. When potential clients searched for “Just Mind Counseling,” they had no idea a second, possibly more convenient location existed. For someone in South Austin, the invisible Westlake office could mean the difference between booking an appointment or choosing a competitor.

The standard forum and agency advice, wait it out, add more reviews, create location pages, wasn’t working. We needed to dig deeper into the prominence and relevance signals Google was using to evaluate each location.

Our multi-location optimization strategy included:

• Schema markup optimization: Added location-specific LocalBusiness schema to clearly communicate that these were distinct physical locations offering the same services.
• Title tag updates: Incorporated full addresses into title tags (e.g., “Just Mind Counseling South Austin, Westlake | 7004 Bee Caves Rd…”).
• Content enhancement: Built substantial, unique content for each location page with embedded maps, detailed facility information, and descriptions that went beyond generic boilerplate.
• Strategic internal linking: Created connections between service pages and location pages, ensuring visitors and search engines understood all services were available at both locations.
• Navigation prominence: Added both locations to the main navigation, elevating their importance in the site hierarchy.
• Updated location imagery: Added more photos of each physical location to their Google Business Profiles.

Within a few months of implementing these changes, both locations began appearing in branded searches. The Westlake location finally had the visibility it deserved, opening up appointment opportunities with clients who would have otherwise never known it existed.

April 2024 – August 2025: Refinement and growth

The relationship evolved from project-based work to ongoing strategic consulting, providing William with support for questions and quick optimizations while larger projects were quoted separately.

William also noted that our focus on content optimization wasn’t just about traditional SEO—it helped Just Mind publish content that was more personalized and meaningful for clients, while staying ahead of how search and large language models interpret and surface information. He’s already seeing that shift show up in reporting, with referrals from ChatGPT continuing to grow.

As Just Mind Counseling planned a complete rebrand with local agency Way Creative, we provided SEO guidance to ensure the new design wouldn’t interfere with their organic performance. This included recommendations for maintaining heading hierarchy, ensuring proper text contrast, and preserving schema markup during the transition.

We continued providing optimizations and outlines for high-opportunity pages:

• Marriage counseling optimizations targeting competitive local keywords
• ADHD counseling updates to capture growing search demand
• Creation of specialized pages for Somatic Experiencing Therapy and Internal Family Systems
• Development of a neurodivergence landing page to capture broader search traffic

The blog strategy became more sophisticated, with systematic updates to high-traffic posts based on search console data and user behavior patterns. We identified posts gaining impressions but losing clicks, updating their title tags and meta descriptions to improve CTR.

• Content Consolidation Strategy: Instead of creating more content, we consolidated competing pages. The anxiety and depression content was spread across multiple URLs, diluting authority. By strategically consolidating and redirecting, we concentrated ranking signals and improved user experience.
• Local SEO Amplification: We leveraged William’s existing local connections, including his leadership of a 2,500-member therapist group and partnerships with organizations like the Austin LGBT Chamber of Commerce. These relationships translated into high-quality local citations and referral traffic.
• Technical SEO Wins: The schema markup cleanup alone improved how their services appeared in search results. Proper therapist schema on bio pages and service schema on treatment pages helped Google understand and display their offerings more effectively.
• Conversion Rate Optimization: While we couldn’t completely overhaul their appointment process (internal systems constraints), we improved CTAs throughout the site and added clear phone number visibility, capitalizing on their preference for phone leads.

While William noted that 2023 remained challenging due to market conditions, our recommendations have helped Just Mind Counseling maintain competitiveness against well-funded competitors:

• Improved organic visibility for target keywords despite increased competition
• Higher-quality leads—and more people actually getting into care—driven by ongoing content refreshes and CRO improvements.
• Enhanced user experience with clearer navigation and better content organization
• Stronger local search presence through optimized GBP profiles and local content
• Better analytics and tracking enabling data-driven decision making
• Streamlined content strategy eliminating cannibalization issues
• Foundation for growth with properly structured technical SEO and content systems

Working with Just Mind taught us about the unique constraints of healthcare marketing. HIPAA compliance isn’t just important—it’s absolutely critical, and it can limit some typical marketing tactics. Their appointment booking system was tied to complex internal workflows that couldn’t be quickly changed, despite the conversion rate implications.

The cash-pay model also presented challenges. While it allowed for higher-quality service delivery, it made them more sensitive to economic headwinds than insurance-accepting competitors. This required a more nuanced approach to messaging and positioning.

Additionally, the rapid consolidation in Austin’s therapy market meant we were often competing against companies with significantly larger marketing budgets and aggressive expansion strategies. Our approach had to focus on authentic differentiation rather than trying to out-spend private equity-backed competitors.

Lastly, our team is in an ongoing consulting role and aren’t in direct control of when and how recommendations are implemented which can slow progress and growth.

This project reinforced several key insights about marketing for healthcare practices:

• Quality over quantity wins long-term: While competitors were rapidly scaling, Just Mind Counseling’s focus on experienced therapists and specialized services created sustainable differentiation. Our content strategy amplified these authentic strengths rather than trying to compete on volume alone.
• Local relationships are gold: William’s genuine connections in the Austin mental health community provided link building and referral opportunities that money can’t buy. The lesson: invest in authentic relationship building, not just link schemes.
• Technical precision matters more in healthcare: HIPAA compliance, proper schema markup, and accurate business information aren’t just SEO best practices, they’re essential for trust and credibility in healthcare. Small technical errors can have an outsized impact on conversion rates.

Working with William has been particularly enjoyable because of his data-driven approach and openness to strategic guidance. His background running a large therapist network meant he understood both the clinical and business sides of the practice, making our recommendations more implementable.

“Some places market SEO and AIO/AEO like they are separate things, but in my opinion they are not. Full Stacks focuses on the full spectrum of online marketing engagement, building a strategy for users and the systems that learn from user patterns.”

“They’re data-first in their approach, which helps us see what’s working and why. And even though we aren’t a huge account, it never feels like ‘you are what you spend’ — there’s real care and planning behind the feedback.”
— William Schroeder, Just Mind Counseling

Just Mind’s story illustrates how local service businesses can compete against well-funded competitors through strategic positioning, technical excellence, and authentic relationship building. Rather than trying to match venture capital marketing budgets, we focused on amplifying existing strengths and removing friction from the user experience.

The ongoing consulting model proved particularly valuable, allowing Just Mind Counseling to stay agile as market conditions and search algorithms evolved. As William continues expanding services and exploring new partnerships, they now have the foundation and strategic support to grow sustainably while maintaining the quality that differentiates them in Austin’s competitive therapy market.

When we first connected with Beau, Bundilla Pest Control had decades of satisfied customers, skilled technicians who’d been with them for years, and a genuine reputation for quality work. What they didn’t have was any way for new customers to discover them.

The Constraints

As a family-run business, Bundilla Pest Control wasn’t short on effort—they were short on time and digital presence. We started by getting honest about what was holding them back:

• A legacy Wix site that was limiting everything from SEO flexibility to user experience. The platform made it nearly impossible to implement proper tracking tools or advanced optimizations.
• No consistent tracking or analytics for leads. They couldn’t tell which marketing efforts (if any) were actually working because nothing was being measured properly.
• Seasonal demand that complicated ad spend and campaign pacing. Pest control in Australia has distinct busy and slow seasons, which meant strategy needed to account for predictable fluctuations.
• Limited time and internal resources to dedicate to ongoing marketing. Beau was wearing multiple hats running the business. He didn’t have time to become a digital marketing expert on top of everything else.
• Low visibility in the local online search market. At position 16 for their primary keyword, they were practically invisible to people searching for pest control services.

The Goals

With constraints on the table, we mapped out what success would actually look like. Beau’s goals were refreshingly straightforward: “Show up better for relevant searches” and “Get more leads.” But we dug deeper to understand how those goals translated into action:

Build a clear, scalable content structure with a focus on informational and location-specific content that would help them rank for the searches that actually drive business.

Measure what drives leads and optimize accordingly. No more guessing: we needed real data about what was working.

Turn offline reputation into online proof through reviews and transparent content. Their existing customers loved them; potential customers needed to see that.

Develop a PPC strategy to capture high-intent local searches and make better use of seasonal ad spend, starting with the Sunshine Coast and expanding later.

First, we made everything measurable

You can’t improve what you can’t measure. Our very first priority was implementing proper tracking so we could actually see what was happening, and more importantly, what was working.

Within the first few weeks, we had Google Tag Manager (GTM) set up and tracking real conversions: form submissions and phone calls. Our tracking grew and evolved with Bundilla Pest Control over time. We also implemented call tracking through Avanser, which was crucial for a service business where many customers prefer to pick up the phone rather than fill out a form. Later, we switched to CallRail.

Suddenly, Beau (and Full Stacks) could see exactly which marketing channels, which keywords, and which pages were actually driving bookings. This wasn’t just nice-to-have data, it fundamentally changed how he could invest his limited marketing budget.

Google Ads that actually generate leads

With tracking in place, we rebuilt their Google Ads campaigns (still called AdWords back then!) from the ground up. We structured campaigns around real customer intent, splitting ad groups by pest type (ants, termites, cockroaches, bed bugs, spiders), and by location, targeting specific suburbs across the Sunshine Coast.

We also set up a brand campaign. The pest control game is a competitive one, with lots of spammy and scammy businesses operating, and many that won’t think twice about borrowing a competitor’s name and reputation. We needed a brand campaign to protect Bundilla Pest Control’s reputation.

Starting with a modest budget, the campaigns started generating qualified leads almost immediately. After a few months of strong performance, we trained Beau on how to manage the campaigns himself. This is something we do often with clients who have the skills and interest of running things in-house.

After some time, he requested we take over the reins again. Since then, his budget and leads have grown exponentially!

Turning happy customers into online proof

Bundilla Pest Control had decades of satisfied customers, but none of that was visible online. We set up a simple, systematic review collection process through GatherUp.

The reviews started rolling in, which told a more effective story than simply copy on a website can: professional technicians, effective treatments, friendly service, problems actually solved. These authentic reviews became one of their strongest marketing assets, providing the social proof that converts searchers into customers.

Since then, Beau has developed their own in-house review process that continuously drives quality reviews to their Google Business Profile.

A content strategy that sounds human

As the business grew and Beau had more budget to invest, we tackled something equally important as rankings: brand voice. Bundilla Pest Control was getting a new logo and visual identity, so it was the perfect time to lock in how they should sound across all communications.

We spent time really understanding what made Bundilla Pest Control different. Their customers trusted them because they were friendly, knowledgeable, and reassuring: not pushy or fear-mongering, like some pest control companies can be. They explained things clearly without using jargon or talking down to people.

Then we built a comprehensive content strategy and site architecture that matched how people actually search for pest control services:

• Detailed service pages for each pest type (ants, termites, cockroaches, spiders, bed bugs, rodents) that explained problems, solutions, and processes in plain language.
• Separate content tracks for residential vs. commercial pest control, since these are fundamentally different audiences with different concerns.
• Location pages for every suburb in their service area. Not thin, duplicate content, but genuinely useful pages that helped those pages rank for “pest control [suburb name]” searches.
• A structured plan for ongoing blog posts and FAQ content answering real customer questions we identified through keyword research and Beau’s knowledge of what customers actually ask.

The ant guarantee: a strategic differentiator

Here’s where strategic insight really paid off. Through conversations with Beau and analyzing search data, we identified something crucial: nearly every Sunshine Coast resident has dealt with ant problems. They’re persistent, frustrating, and often require multiple treatments to fully resolve.

Together, we developed what became Bundilla Pest Control’s signature offering: a 12-month ant-free guarantee. If ants came back within a year, Bundilla Pest Control would return and treat them again at no extra cost. This wasn’t just marketing positioning, it was a real guarantee backed by Bundilla Pest Control’s confidence in their treatment methods.

This simple differentiator became a cornerstone of their marketing strategy. It gave people a concrete reason to choose Bundilla Pest Control over competitors, demonstrated confidence in their work, and directly addressed the specific anxiety people have about pest control: “What if they just come back?”

Over the years, this concept evolved into their Deluxe and Supreme Packages, which expanded the guarantee across multiple pest types. But the ant guarantee was where it started, and it perfectly illustrated what makes effective marketing: finding something genuinely valuable about your service and communicating it clearly.

Squarespace: the necessary stepping stone

The original Wix site had served its purpose, but it was actively holding them back. The biggest issue was analytics limitations. We couldn’t implement proper call tracking or Google Tag Manager functionality, which meant we were still partially flying blind on attribution. We also couldn’t implement many on-page SEO optimizations that would help them rank better.

Beau agreed to migrate to Squarespace, which gave us significantly more flexibility. We rebuilt the site with a much better structure:

• Clear, prominent calls-to-action on every page (something the old Wix site desperately lacked). We wanted visitors to always know their next step, whether that was calling, booking online, or learning more.
• Individual, well-optimized service pages for every pest type with FAQ sections addressing common concerns.
• Suburb-specific pages for location targeting that helped with local SEO efforts.
• A GatherUp review widget prominently displayed on key pages, showcasing their growing collection of positive customer reviews.

We also worked with Beau on professional photography. This is a big deal for pest control companies as technicians come into people’s homes. The old site focused heavily on stock photos of bugs and pests. The new site showed real people: friendly, professional technicians in Bundilla Pest Control uniforms that customers could trust to enter their homes.

The WordPress leap: unlocking real seo power

After a year on Squarespace showing strong results, we had a strategic conversation with Beau about making another leap: moving to WordPress. Squarespace was a massive improvement from Wix and fit within his budget at the time, but WordPress would unlock significantly more possibilities for technical SEO, site speed optimization, structured data implementation, and long-term scalability.

The WordPress website launched in March 2020. Yes, right at the start of COVID-19. Despite launching during a pandemic, the results were immediate and dramatic. Compared to the previous year, they saw a 340% increase in organic search traffic. Some of that was due to the site being technically faster and better structured. Some was our SEO work finally having the proper technical foundation to build on. But all of it came together to create significant, sustainable growth.

We completely redesigned the site navigation to better organize their service types and make it easier for visitors to find exactly what they needed. We gave termite services (one of their highest-value offerings) more prominent placement throughout the site. We implemented comprehensive structured data markup (schema) to help search engines better understand the services, service areas, and business information. And we optimized site speed and Core Web Vitals to improve both user experience and search rankings.

In 2023, we updated the website again, moving to Full Stacks’s The Basic Theme. Still on WordPress, we made the move to this theme for future-proofing and stability: it made it easier to track events, add technical SEO elements, and add / update content.

Beyond Google My Business Basics

When we started focused SEO work in early 2019, much of the initial effort was unglamorous technical groundwork; the kind that doesn’t produce immediate wins but creates the foundation for everything else.

We thoroughly optimized their Google Business Profile: accurate categories, regular posts, high-quality photos, systematic review responses, and cleaning up incorrect citations across the web. Writing Google Posts took us deep into Australian pest behaviour and seasonal patterns. (Our director of SEO, Elizabeth, jokes she could compete on Jeopardy if they ever have a Queensland ant species category.)

But local SEO extends far beyond Google Business Profiles. We built location-specific pages for every suburb in their service area: not thin duplicate content, but genuinely useful pages with local context and clear signals about where Bundilla Pest Control operates.

We also battled persistent Google Maps spam: businesses keyword-stuffing names and fake addresses. We reported violations while building Bundilla Pest Control’s authentic presence so that spam competitors couldn’t compete on quality signals.

Service pages built for both users and search engines

Beyond local optimization, we methodically worked through comprehensive on-page SEO improvements:

• Monitoring title tag and meta description performance in search results and continuously refining them based on actual click-through data.
• Improving heading structure (H1, H2, H3 tags) to create better content hierarchy for both readability and search engine understanding.
• Adding detailed FAQ sections to service pages that answered specific questions people were actually searching for.
• Updating older blog posts to better match current search intent and incorporate related keywords naturally.
• Creating a strategic internal linking structure that helped both users navigate logically, and search engines understand page importance and relationships.

The content strategy we’d developed years earlier evolved from planning documents into a living, breathing system. New blog posts systematically answered specific questions people were searching for: “How to get rid of ants in kitchen,” “Signs of termite damage in Queensland homes,” “Are pest control treatments safe for pets and children?” Each piece was optimized not just for search engines, but for genuinely helping people, something that is true of Bundilla Pest Control as a business.

This strategy is still in play today, with the addition of updating blogs and content to incorporate how people are using AI to find what they are looking for.

Streamlining the booking process

For years, customers filled out inquiry forms and waited for follow-up. This created friction: customers weren’t sure their request went through, admin staff spent time on back-and-forth scheduling, and opportunities were lost.

We implemented a true online booking system integrated with their scheduling software. Customers could now select services, choose available time slots, and receive instant confirmation.

The results: total Google-sourced revenue increased 14.7% year-over-year, more booking opportunities generated, and admin time reduced. But the data revealed something important: some customers love online booking’s convenience, while others prefer speaking with someone for consultation and recommendations.

Rather than forcing everyone through one path, we serve both segments. The hybrid approach accommodates different customer preferences while continuing to optimize each channel.

Expanding into new markets strategically

In 2020, Bundilla Pest Control expanded into North Brisbane as a service area business. We built a multi-channel strategy: set up a Google Business Profile, created suburb-specific landing pages (Strathpine, Petrie, Redcliffe, Albany Creek), and launched targeted PPC campaigns with location-specific ad groups and copy.

The dual approach worked: SEO built organic momentum while Google Ads provided instant visibility. We carefully monitored to ensure North Brisbane content didn’t cannibalize their core Sunshine Coast rankings.

Eventually, maintaining a North Brisbane service area address just for the GBP became unsustainable. Losing that listing overnight was frustrating, but it forced us to prove our strategy didn’t depend on a single tactic.

We pivoted: expanded North Brisbane suburb pages with comprehensive FAQs and local content, integrated North Brisbane mentions naturally throughout the site, and strengthened schema markup and internal linking to maintain local authority signals. We also increased PPC investment, expanding budgets and adding granular suburb targeting.

With lessons learned, especially that diversification of channels matters, we applied the refined playbook to Morayfield and Caboolture: suburb pages from day one, dedicated PPC campaigns, and content addressing rural and semi-rural pest challenges.

By 2025, the multi-location strategy enabled Beau to hire additional staff and bring a marketing specialist in-house for day-to-day PPC and social media. Our partnership shifted to higher-level strategy and technical SEO.

While strategy and relationships matter, numbers are what keep businesses growing and allow them to hire more staff and serve more customers.

Search Visibility Breakthrough:

• Improved rankings across dozens of related pest-specific and location-specific search terms (For example, from position 16 to position 3 for “Pest Control Sunshine Coast”)
• Warana suburb rankings improved from position 11 to position 2 for key local searches
• Achieved stronger visibility across all target suburbs throughout the Sunshine Coast and North Brisbane

Traffic Growth:

• Revenue grew 18% in the first seven months of working together.
• 340% increase in organic search traffic and a 146% increase in organic conversions after we had launched the new WordPress site in 2020, compared to the previous year.
• Consistent year-over-year traffic growth and improved conversion rates. For example, a 60% increase in organic traffic and a 196% increase in organic conversions in 2024 compared to the previous year.
• 81% increase in conversion rates over the past year, with a 23% increase in total conversions.
• PPC budget increased over 500% as a result of positive ROI.
• +85% more opportunities from online booking vs the old form.
• +15% YoY lift in total Google-sourced revenue with online booking adding to, not replacing, call and email leads.

Real Business Outcomes:

• Hired new staff members directly as a result of increased business volume
• Expanded into new service areas (North Brisbane) based on digital success
• Hired an in-house marketing specialist to handle social media and other day-to-day marketing tasks
• Built and maintained a 4.8-star rating from over 1,000+ customer reviews on Google
• Expanded into Microsoft Ads to capitalize on the ROI of the Google Ads campaigns

Quality Over Volume:

• Conversion rates improved even during periods when traffic dipped slightly, demonstrating better traffic quality
• Higher engagement metrics showed visitors were finding exactly what they needed
• Better qualified leads meant higher close rates and more efficient use of technician time

When Beau saw one particularly strong traffic report showing 720% year-over-year growth, he sent us this message: “I know you’d told me the figure before, but it really didn’t seep in. I was drinking my morning tea when I read your first sentence and nearly choked. It’s sinking in now (kinda). 720% is f***ing epic! No other way to describe it. Well done.”

That reaction perfectly captures what makes this work rewarding—seeing real business transformation, not vanity metrics.

Nearly ten years into this partnership, the work continues to evolve. One of the most rewarding outcomes of our long-term partnership is that Bundilla Pest Control’s growth has enabled them to hire a dedicated in-house digital marketing specialist. This wasn’t just a nice-to-have hire, it was a strategic necessity born from success. As the business grew, what used to be manageable (Beau reviewing content, managing social media and other day-to-day marketing tasks) became a bottleneck that was limiting how fast Bundilla Pest Control could continue to grow in an ever-changing industry.

Their internal marketing specialist now handles social media management, content reviewing, their Google Business Profile, and PPC campaign management. This frees up Beau to focus on running and growing the business rather than being pulled into marketing execution constantly.

For us, this shift is exactly the kind of growth trajectory we love to see. We want to help businesses grow to the point where they can build internal capabilities. Our role has evolved from doing everything to a strategic partnership: we handle the complex technical SEO work, develop comprehensive strategies, provide support for ongoing SEO work, and focus on the specialized expertise that doesn’t make sense to hire for in-house.

Our strategy has grown to include:

Advanced SEO and technical optimization: Continuing to build market share in their expanded North Brisbane service areas, where there’s still significant opportunity for growth.

Strategic link building: We’ve developed an actionable link-building strategy that both our team and Bundilla Pest Control’s internal team can work on together: getting quality backlinks from local business associations, industry directories, community partnerships, and relevant local content sites.

Content strategy evolution: Expanding informational content to stay ahead of search trends, algorithm updates, and competitor movements. The pest control market in Australia is competitive, so maintaining momentum requires continuous adaptation.

Offline brand awareness: Supporting Bundilla Pest Control’s efforts to connect online success with offline presence through community involvement, local sponsorships, and partnerships that create both brand awareness and valuable backlinks.

Video content strategy: We started a video strategy for Bundilla Pest Control earlier in our partnership that the team didn’t have time to implement, but we’re able to once again build on that strategy with their in-house marketing team member!

Preparing for AI Search: As the way people search is evolving rapidly, we’re proactively updating Bundilla Pest Control’s website content and blog strategy to capture visibility in these new AI formats:

• Structuring content to be easily parsed by AI systems: clear, authoritative answers to specific questions
• Monitoring existing schema markup and implementing newly relevant markup that helps AI understand their services, coverage areas, and expertise
• Creating FAQ content that directly addresses how people actually phrase questions to AI assistants
• Optimizing content and building out citations to help Bundilla Pest Control show up when AI tools recommend local service providers

One example of this strategy in action: pricing information. Many pest control companies (including Bundilla Pest Control) are hesitant to publish pricing online. But we recognized that “how much does pest control cost” is one of the most common questions people ask, both in traditional search and when using AI tools. After getting approval to add transparent pricing to the website, we created a dedicated pricing page and added pricing tables to key service area pages.

The results validated the strategy almost immediately: Bundilla Pest Control now appears in AI Overviews for pricing-related queries and location-specific searches like “how much does pest control cost in the sunshine coast.” Answering commonly asked questions clearly and formatting content properly makes a tangible difference in visibility, especially as AI systems parse and recommend information.

Nearly a decade of partnership teaches you things you can’t learn from a six-month project. Here’s what really matters:

• The long game wins. We built a proper foundation and compounded small improvements over years—less sexy than promising “page one in 30 days,” but it actually works. Local SEO is slow: rankings, reviews, and authority compound over time with no real shortcuts.
• Strategic constraints force better decisions. Beau’s modest initial budget meant ruthless prioritization. We couldn’t do everything at once, so we focused on the highest-impact work first. The phased approach reduced risk and built trust as each phase delivered results that justified the next investment.
• Quality always beats volume. Months when traffic dipped, but conversions increased taught us to obsess over the right people finding Bundilla Pest Control, not just any people. Better targeting and content that actually help create dramatically better results than just driving clicks or chasing a ranking position.
• Measurement enables everything. You cannot optimize what you cannot measure. Getting GTM, conversion tracking, and call tracking right in the first weeks was one of our best decisions. Every improvement after that was built on solid data.
• Real differentiators beat clever positioning. The ant guarantee wasn’t marketing fluff, it was a legitimate offering that addressed genuine customer anxiety (“What if they come back?”). The best marketing comes from something genuinely valuable about your service, not just copywriting.
• Authentic content performs better. Bundilla Pest Control’s content sounds like Beau or his technicians explaining something to a customer, not an SEO robot stuffing keywords. That authentic voice builds trust and performs better in algorithms that increasingly reward genuine helpfulness.
• Transparency builds trust. Being honest about challenges, setbacks, and realistic timelines built far more trust than overpromising.
• Platform changes require constant adaptation. Google constantly updates algorithms, ad platforms, and local search. What worked two years ago needs adjustment today. We pivot when we need to.
• Operational realities shape strategy. Time zones between Canada and Australia, seasonal demand fluctuations (reversed seasons!), Beau’s bandwidth constraints, and competitive tactics all required strategic adaptation. The partnership model works because we handle what they can’t execute internally while training their team on what they can.
• Relationships are the secret ingredient. Beau’s transparency about his full business context, not just marketing, allowed us to give better strategic advice. When he needed to manage Google Ads himself to save fees, we trained him and stepped back. When his team got overwhelmed, we subbed in.
• The human side matters too: Christmas wine and chocolates from Australia, celebrating wins together, becoming near-experts on Queensland ant species, learning Aussie slang. These touchpoints accumulate into something that feels less like a vendor relationship and more like a genuine partnership.

“Once we started with Full Stacks, everything started to move along very well. Everything we received was presented in easy to understand English and in a fun and helpful way. All of the team at Full Stacks are nice, fun, warm, and really know their stuff.

And then the results started rolling in… Very soon after engaging Full Stacks we saw a great return on our investment. I hadn’t been running the business long, and I was pretty dubious on how our existing advertising was working. And I was equally skeptical about all other forms of advertising (radio, paper, TV, etc). I had managed to find a way to measure all of my advertising at the time, and pretty much nothing was working. Except Full Stacks was kicking arse. All of a sudden we had a reliable funnel for new leads, which was something we were sorely missing up to that point.”

— Beau Rheinberger, General Manager, Bundilla Pest Control

Fringe’s website has to serve wildly different people, often with competing priorities:

• Festival-goers trying to find shows, tickets, and schedules.
• Artists looking for application info, guidelines, and support.
• Volunteers needing shifts, training, and updates.
• Donors and sponsors who want clear ways to give and understand impact.
• Rental clients exploring venues and technical specs for events outside the festival.

Those needs change over the course of a year. In August, everyone wants festival shows and tickets. In the off-season, it might be rentals, donations, or other programming.

On top of that:

• The site had grown in a somewhat organic way, so important pages weren’t discoverable from the main nav.
• A third-party ticketing system (RED61) handled show data and purchases off-site, and many users found it confusing.
• Multiple staff and volunteers touched the site, so the CMS needed to be safe and intuitive for many editors, not just one web person.
• The problem wasn’t just design. It was navigation and information architecture.

We started with listening. Fringe and Full Stacks collaborated on audience surveys for artists, patrons, volunteers, and rental clients.

While we mainly heard from patrons and volunteers, we still gleaned some valuable insights about all audiences.

• A clearer sense of what each audience needed from the site.
• Insights into pain points around information, sign-ups, and ticketing.
• Clarity about how often those audiences used the site and for what.

In parallel, Fringe compiled a list of all the pages they had (and needed) across the site. From there, we developed a suggested sitemap, working closely with the executive director and team to decide what belongs in the top navigation, what should live in subsections, and what can be merged, retired, and simplified.

The point was to give Fringe a workable, flexible structure that would evolve with them, rather than a “perfect”, permanent information architecture (IA).”

From research and IA discussions, it became clear: the new site needed more than a basic dropdown.

We designed a navigation system in layers:

1. Mega menu for orientation
   A structured mega menu helps visitors see “the big picture”:
   • Festival info, year-round programming, rentals, donate, about.
   • Logical groupings under each, rather than a long, chaotic list.
   • Room for a primary, contextual call-to-action highlight for each section (e.g., “Buy Festival Tickets,” “Donate Now,” “See What’s On”).
2. Sidebar navigation for deep sections
   Some sections are deep: policies, artist resources, opportunities, etc. We added a collapsible sidebar menu for those. When you land on a section, the sidebar starts to expand, giving you a clear sense of what’s within that category. As you scroll, it collapses, so it doesn’t dominate the layout, and users can open/close it at will.

   This keeps in-depth sections navigable without cluttering the global nav.

3. On-page wayfinding blocks
   Within pages, we designed content blocks (cards, CTA strips, stacked links) that Fringe can use to point people to related content, promote key calls to action (e.g., “Volunteer,” “Book a Space,” “Apply as an Artist”), and make long pages scannable for visitors who just want “that one thing.”

The combination of mega menu, sidebar menu, and in-page blocks turns the site into a map, instead of a maze.

Fringe has a vibrant visual brand, but the reality is:

• Their photo library is varied in quality and aspect ratio.
• Many show photos belong to artists with their own rights and styles.
• They can’t rely on consistent, high-quality imagery for every page.

So the design had to work beautifully even with minimal images; use typography, layout, and colour as the main drivers of hierarchy, and treat photos as enhancements, not requirements.

A few key choices:

• A homepage banner slider (one of the rare times we agreed a slider made sense!), with:
  • Strict timing and motion controls.
  • Play/pause and slide selection controls for accessibility.
  • Room to feature multiple big things (festival, café, rentals, special events).
• Calmer colour palette in the UI:
  • Fringe’s palette is effectively a rainbow, but we used it strategically.
  • Colour is used to highlight links, icons, and key sections, not to overwhelm.
  • Footer logos and funder blocks were tamed so it doesn’t become a “logo garden.”
• Layouts that stack cleanly on mobile and tablet, with special attention to iPad use (a common device around the festival timeline).

This made the site feel distinctly “Fringe” without relying on perfect photography.

Originally, we planned to use our own custom field-based framework. But as WordPress evolved and the client became more familiar with Gutenberg, Fringe asked:

“Can we have it built with Gutenberg instead?”

We said yes, and used this project as the catalyst to rebuild our internal framework around Gutenberg blocks.

Together we designed:

• A Flex Page template:
  • Used for most of the site.
  • Includes all the blocks Fringe can mix and match: text, images, staff grids, FAQs, callouts, etc.
  • Recommended for pages like Our Team, About, and other informational content.
• Dedicated templates for:
  • Blog—including filter controls for exploring stories, news, and updates.
  • Blog Post—focusing on readable typography and clear CTAs.
  • Search Results—including examples of how off-site show results (from RED61) will appear.

This block-based approach means that Fringe staff and volunteers can build new pages with confidence, and don’t have to call Full Stacks every time they need a new layout.

It also means the site stays consistent, even with many editors, because the design system is encoded into the blocks.

Ticketing is handled by RED61, a third-party system that Fringe has a long-term partnership with. Many users find being shot off to an external ticketing platform confusing or jarring.

To make that connection more natural, we:

• Used the RED61 API to pull show information into Fringe’s own site search.
• Let visitors search for shows directly on fringetheatre.ca, then click through to RED61 to complete the purchase.
• Designed search results that clearly indicate:
  • Which results are internal content (blogs, information pages).
  • Which results are shows, with clear “Buy tickets” or “More info” links.

We also designed filters so that during festival time, visitors can limit search to shows only, making it easier to get to what they want quickly.

This doesn’t remove RED61, but it wraps it in a better, more Fringe-aligned experience.

The new fringetheatre.ca was built to help people get to the right information faster, especially during the festival rush. Early performance data shows stronger engagement with festival content, increased use of on-site show search, and improvements in conversion performance.

What improved for audiences

More people used the on-site show search:

• +38% increase in the share of users who used the website’s show search
• This supports the goal of keeping visitors oriented on fringetheatre.ca, even when ticket purchases still happen in RED61

Festival pages held attention longer:

• +15% increase in average time spent on festival-specific pages over the past year

This suggests visitors are finding what they need and spending more time with key festival content

More conversions, with better efficiency:

• +20% increase in total conversions
• +6% increase in conversion rate (conversion efficiency improved)

This indicates the site is doing a better job guiding users toward key actions, even across multiple audience types

Launch Impact

Engagement rose after the new site launched:

• +71% increase in engagement rate compared to the previous year’s launch period

Average time on page increased:

• +13 seconds increase in average time spent on page

Every project has constraints; this one was no exception:

• Third-party ticketing (RED61):
  • Could not be swapped.
  • UX was limited by what their system could do.
  • We mitigated this with better on-site search and show listings, but the checkout experience is still external.
• Budget and capacity:
  • Fringe is a non-profit still recovering from COVID impacts.
  • Scope had to be tightly managed; we focused on the site that delivers the most value, not a dozen side projects.
• Many editors:
  • The CMS needed to be safe for multiple staff and volunteers with different technical comfort levels.
• Constantly changing priorities:
  • Fringe is a very dynamic organization. They do not sit still and their website needed to be as flexible as possible to accommodate new pages, changes in navigation, etc. This couldn’t be a site that is crafted to an ideal state and could be maintained with little changes over time.

We handled these by designing around reality, not a hypothetical best case.

From Full Stacks’s perspective, this project reinforced a few things:

• Not every site relies on SEO!
  While we still baked in the SEO fundamentals we always do, the Fringe site is so specific that it doesn’t need to rely on search. Getting traffic to the site isn’t an issue (and often results in the site needing larger bandwidth in August while the festival is on!) Instead, our focus needed to be on clear wayfinding and simple UX for the users that are already on site.
• Gutenberg can be a powerful foundation
  Rebuilding our block framework for Fringe set us up for future Gutenberg projects and gave Fringe a much better editorial experience.
• Working with external systems is part of the job
  Instead of complaining about RED61, we integrated it and improved what was in our control.
• Process and collaboration matter
  The project moved smoothly because Fringe:
  • Took surveys and page inventories seriously.
  • Gave clear feedback on wireframes and designs.
  • Was flexible, collaborative and kind throughout!
  • Owned content creation and entry so that we could focus on strategy, design and development.

It was the kind of partnership where both teams made each other’s work better!