Subaru

Subaru's regional distributor invested heavily in Google Ads display campaigns, but had no reliable view of what that spend produced. Display works largely through post-view conversions, which standard analytics doesn't capture — so campaigns were judged on clicks alone.

The bigger gap was between online and offline: test-drive requests and calls were tracked on the website, while actual vehicle and service sales lived in the CRM. Without joining the two, marketing couldn't see which channels led to sold cars — only to form submissions.

Subaru started from an enhanced Google Analytics setup with call and form tracking in order to understand which sessions lead to a test-drive. Since Subaru invests heavily in Google Ads display campaigns, it was crucial to understand post-view conversions, which is why parallel tracking was implemented in 360 Campaign Manager.

As real-time data was not required, Subaru set up batch data downloads from Google Analytics, Campaign Manager 360 and CRM to Google Cloud Platform, and joined test-drive entries with vehicle purchases. An automatic Data Studio report with key business and digital marketing metrics was created to monitor campaign performance in real time.

A sales funnel report was created as well, starting from calls and form submissions, ending up with car or service sales with marketing channel breakdown.

Subaru was able to successfully connect online and offline data. These connection efforts resulted in a 41% increase in ROAS for Subaru’s entire digital marketing stack. Through this work, Subaru can better understand customer journeys and feel confident in their campaigns’ performance.