Finding Opportunities in Adversity with Proton VPN
BACKGROUND
- The recent introduction of legislation in the US enabling tighter content censorship caused frustration for a lot of the population. It reignited major concerns over privacy and surveillance that had been simmering for some time, in a political climate already close to boiling point.
- Within this moment of unrest, the team at Proton spotted an opportunity. With traffic to the site on the increase, the potential in positioning their product as the solution for disenfranchised internet users was huge.
- As their paid media agency, we needed to work together to find a way of speaking directly to these audiences, using all of the ad formats at our disposal through Google.
SOLUTION
-
Implementing at Speed
-
Knowing the impact of striking quickly, we rapidly built out new messaging and creative for two new asset groups within our US PMAX campaigns.
-
The first addressed on the topic of ‘content’, with messaging focused on user privacy. The second was built around ‘surveillance’, which focused specifically on protecting user data from Big Tech and the US government.
-
We kept BAU campaigns running alongside this activity to help us measure the impact properly, which would inform future budget decisions.
RESULTS
- Campaign performance far exceeded our expectations. Over a 3 month period (Feb-May 2025) these campaigns drove 85% of all subscriptions coming from our US PMax campaigns.
- When compared to BAU asset groups, we were seeing a 4x increase in CTR and a 3x increase in subscriptions, a huge boost in performance.
- This is a perfect example of why partnerships between agency and customer are critical to success. The expertise of the Proton VPN team helped us understand the opportunity in their industry. Our paid media knowledge then brought that to life.
IMPACT
Increase in subscriptions vs BAU
3
x
Increase in CTR vs BAU
x
Static CPA vs BAU
%
Paid Search
Finding Opportunities in Adversity with Proton VPN
Phil Bennings
Reading time: 7 minutes
Cross Channel
MVMT: Helping their internal team get people dancing!
Hana Genena
Reading time: 5 minutes
Paid Search
Maison Flâneur: AI Toolkit transforms Shopping performance
Jack Carr
Reading time: 5 minutes
Cross Channel
4Living: Bridging Measurement Gaps to Drive Performance
Jack Carr
Reading time: 5 minutes
Cross Channel
Verticode: Qualified Leads For A Development Agency
Fred Maude
Reading time: 3 minutes
