How we helped NOW Broadband unlock a new growth path and increase conversions by 751%

NOW Broadband operates in one of the most competitive categories in New Zealand.

Competing against dominant players like Spark, One NZ, Voyager and Chorus, they were a credible challenger—but not yet front-of-mind.

Backed by Mercury, the ambition was clear. NOW was looking to strengthen its presence in the New Zealand market, build a more meaningful position within the business segment, and create a more sustainable acquisition model that would improve efficiency over time and increase long-term customer value.

They knew there was a real opportunity in the business market, but weren’t yet seeing that translate consistently into results.

The reality was more complex.

The consumer market was highly price-driven, with limited room to differentiate. At the same time, while NOW had strong service capability and a genuine point of difference, this wasn’t consistently coming through in their digital performance.

Activity was already in place across Google Ads, display and social. What was missing was a clear strategy to prioritise the right audiences, create cut-through, and turn intent into consistent, scalable demand.

They didn’t need more activity. They needed a smarter way to compete.

Rather than competing broadly, we focused on a persona-led growth strategy, designed to create traction in specific segments before scaling.

Start narrow: identifying the right entry point

To support NOW’s ambition of building a stronger position in the business market, we worked together to identify where they had the greatest opportunity to gain early traction.

Instead of targeting all businesses, we selected a pilot persona within the property sector.

This segment was chosen deliberately:

• high reliance on connectivity
• clear switching triggers such as moves, developments and tenancy changes
• strong commercial value
• and enough scale to justify focused investment

This allowed us to validate a more targeted approach—testing messaging, targeting and conversion performance—before rolling it out more broadly.

Aligning to real buying moments

A key shift was moving away from generic broadband messaging and toward the moments that actually drive decision-making.

As one of the consistent themes from the NOW team highlighted:

“Businesses are busy—they don’t have time to think about this stuff.”

We anchored activity around real-world triggers such as:

• businesses relocating
• teams growing
• contracts ending
• dissatisfaction with current providers

This ensured NOW was showing up at the point of need, helping to improve acquisition efficiency while building a more consistent flow of qualified demand.

Building a credible challenger position

For NOW, success wasn’t about competing on price—it was about competing differently.

They had clear points of difference—particularly around service and responsiveness—but these weren’t being consistently brought through in-market.

We worked to strengthen positioning across campaigns and landing experiences, ensuring those strengths were clearly articulated and aligned to what mattered most to business customers.

This played a key role in supporting their broader ambition to strengthen brand presence and reputation, particularly within the business segment, and to be seen as a credible alternative to larger providers.

Creating a system that could learn and scale

To support long-term growth, we implemented a structured, test-and-learn approach.

This focused on:

• continuous testing and iteration
• refining messaging and creative
• improving targeting precision
• strengthening conversion pathways

The programme was highly collaborative. Working closely with Amy and the NOW team, we were able to move quickly—testing ideas, responding to insights, and refining campaigns in real time as performance data came through.

That responsiveness was critical. It allowed us to maintain momentum, make confident decisions, and continuously improve results without long delays or over-engineering the process.

Alongside this, we worked to improve data quality and tracking, helping build a more connected view of performance and laying the foundations for a more scalable, efficient growth engine over time.

The results

Within six months of restructuring the approach:

• Conversions increased by 751% (60 → 506)
• Clicks increased by 181%
• Impressions increased by 277%
• Cost increased by only 34%

More importantly, the strategy delivered on its intent.

The property sector pilot quickly emerged as a major driver of performance, with over 130% uplift in conversions, validating the decision to focus on specific personas as a pathway to broader growth.

What this means

This was more than a performance improvement.

It established a clearer pathway for NOW to grow in a competitive market.

They now have:

• a more defined entry point into the business segment
• a repeatable model for expanding into new personas
• and a more structured, scalable approach to demand generation

Instead of broad, fragmented activity, NOW is now building a system that supports both short-term performance and long-term customer value.

What’s next

With the initial approach validated, the focus now shifts to expanding into additional high-value segments, strengthening proof points and content, and continuing to align sales and marketing into a more integrated growth engine.

The long-term objective is clear.

To establish NOW as a high-performing challenger brand, capable of competing with larger providers through precision, agility and a better customer experience.