By Charlotte, non-branded growth for an aesthetic-led jewellery brand.
By Charlotte was founded in 2012 by former make-up artist Charlotte Blakeney, making sterling silver, vermeil and 14k gold jewellery built around mindfulness and storytelling. The brand had already performed well in the Australian boho jewellery space, with two problems underneath. Revenue and return on ad spend swung with the calendar, strong through sale events and weak between them, which made forecasting difficult. And most organic traffic was existing customers searching the brand name, with no meaningful ranking on category terms such as earrings, rings, hoops and necklaces.
By Charlotte: SEM, SEO and paid social rebuilt for non-branded growth.
Three workstreams ran under one retainer.
SEM was restructured out of seasonal campaigns into an always-on architecture, with the best-performing Search and Shopping campaigns built on year-round bestsellers, and seasonal Search, Shopping and Display layered on top for sale moments and new product launches. Across 2019 SEM return on ad spend reached 55:1 and held through non-sale months, with impressions up 114% and clicks up 89.9% against the previous structure.
SEO covered on-page work across collection pages, including metadata carrying value props such as Afterpay to lift click-through from the results page, plus an outreach-led link campaign into fashion and jewellery editorial. Organic revenue grew 93% year on year, organic became the largest channel by volume, and the brand took top-three rankings on non-branded terms including earrings and necklaces.
Paid social ran as a two-week full-funnel burst into the Christmas gifting window: cold prospecting, interest-qualified retargeting and existing-customer reactivation. It produced more than 300 conversions and over $60,000 in directly attributed revenue at a 15.7:1 return, with some retargeting ad sets peaking at 49.96:1.
Source: Google Ads, Google Analytics and Meta Ads Manager. By Charlotte engagement, full-year 2019 with an isolated two-week paid-social burst.
Strong brand, unstable growth, branded-only search demand.
By Charlotte had already performed well in the boho jewellery space in Australia, but their weakness was result and growth consistency month-on-month. Revenue and ROAS would fluctuate based on the calendar, strong during sale events, weak in non-sale months, which made forecasting and planning almost impossible.
On the visibility side, most of By Charlotte's organic traffic was existing customers searching for the brand name. They didn't rank meaningfully for non-branded jewellery terms, "earrings", "rings", "hoops", "necklaces", "Australian jewellery", so the brand was effectively invisible to new customers searching for the category rather than the label.
And on Paid Social, a high-intent channel for a photography-led jewellery brand, they were under-using the platform in a vertical so competitive that breaking through required a structured full-funnel approach, not boosted posts.
SEM "always-on", non-branded SEO, full-funnel Paid Social.
Three coordinated workstreams under one retainer. SEM: we restructured the account from seasonal campaigns into an "always-on" architecture, so the best-performing Search and Shopping campaigns learn and compound year-round on year-round bestsellers, with seasonal Search, Shopping, and Display layered on top for sale moments and new product launches.
SEO: a full programme covering on-page optimisation of collection pages (metadata, content, value-prop additions like Afterpay in metadata to lift CTR from the SERP), and an outreach-led link-building campaign targeting fashion and jewellery editorial, building authority back to the high-commercial-intent collection pages.
Paid Social: a full-funnel structure with creative and messaging built for three audiences in sequence, cold prospecting, interest-qualified retargeting, and existing-customer reactivation. The channel ran as a sharp two-week burst designed to capture the Christmas / peak-gifting demand window without spending the whole year warming it up.
What "always-on + non-branded + full-funnel" actually looked like.
Stable SEM, organic traffic as #1 channel, $60k+ in a two-week paid-social burst.
55:1 ROAS, stable across the year
After a year of the always-on approach, SEM ROAS climbed as high as 55:1 throughout 2019, without the sporadic decreases the account had previously seen during non-sale months. Always-on activity kept new traffic moving to the site continuously, delivering a 114% increase in impressions and an 89.9% increase in clicks against the prior account structure.
+93% YoY revenue, organic becomes #1 channel
Once SEO had associated By Charlotte with generic (rather than branded) keywords, organic traffic became the largest channel by total volume. Year-on-year organic revenue grew 93%. By Charlotte earned top-three search engine rankings on competitive non-branded keywords including "earrings" and "necklaces", alongside a large number of secondary non-branded terms.
300+ conversions, $60k+, 15.7:1 ROI in two weeks
Over a two-week burst, By Charlotte's Paid Social campaigns generated 300+ conversions and more than $60,000 in directly-attributed revenue. The full-funnel structure averaged a 15.7:1 return on investment, with some retargeting ad sets peaking at 49.96:1, the channel elevated the Christmas sales period and unlocked revenue the brand had been leaving on the table.
Three channels, one operating discipline
The By Charlotte engagement is the worked example of the pattern we run across aesthetic-led Australian B2C jewellery and fashion brands: SEM rebuilt for stability not seasonality, SEO targeted at non-branded category demand, Paid Social structured full-funnel and timed for occasion windows. Three channels, three different jobs, one operating discipline.
What ran across the funnel.
By Charlotte's world, the creative we run the media against.
What did 121 Group do for By Charlotte?
121 Group ran SEO, Google Ads and paid social for By Charlotte.
What industry is this fashion and beauty case study in?
By Charlotte operates in fashion and beauty. 121 Group works across nine verticals, with case studies published for each.
What results did the By Charlotte programme produce?
55:1 Return on ad spend The challenge Strong brand, unstable growth, branded-only search demand.
Aesthetic-led Australian jewellery brand, stuck on branded demand?
Thirty-minute call. We'll look at your SEM account structure (always-on vs seasonal), your non-branded SEO position, and whether your Paid Social funnel is built to convert or just to be present.