How Brendan Transport Generated Over 73,000 Conversions Across Seven Google Ads Campaigns
Brendan Transport runs 7 vehicle-segment Google Ads campaigns spanning General, Van Starex, Bus, Vellfire/Alphard, Singapore, Indonesia, and International routes. By separating each segment into its own campaign, the account achieved a blended RM13.93 cost-per-conversion — with the Bus campaign delivering the lowest CPA at RM12.61 and Van Starex at RM12.76. The account maintains a 75.65% top-of-page impression share across 6.15 million total impressions. The primary growth lever: three campaigns are losing impression share due to daily budget limits, with the Bus campaign alone losing 34.92% of available search visibility.
A Malaysian ground transport operator built one of the most cost-efficient paid search accounts in the industry — spending RM1 million and keeping cost-per-conversion below RM14 across every vehicle segment.
Most businesses that spend RM1 million on Google Ads have very little to show for exactly how that money moved. They know their total spend, maybe a rough sense of bookings, and not much else. Brendan Transport is not that business.
Over the full campaign lifetime tracked in this account, Brendan generated 73,384 conversions at an average cost of RM13.93 per conversion — a number that would be considered exceptional even for a low-value consumer product. For a premium ground transport and chauffeur service operating across Malaysia and the region, it is genuinely impressive.
What made it work was not a single clever tactic. It was structure. Seven campaigns, each built around a specific vehicle type or market, each allowed to optimise independently — and the results reflect that discipline.
This case study breaks down exactly how the account is architected, what each segment contributes, and where the next wave of growth is sitting untouched.
Why Segment-Level Campaigns Beat One Big Campaign
Many advertisers run a single campaign for their entire business and wonder why results plateau. The problem is straightforward: a Van Starex rental query and a luxury Vellfire hire query are completely different searches, made by different people, for different occasions, at very different price points.
Brendan’s account addresses this directly. Each major vehicle type — General, Van Starex, Bus, Vellfire/Alphard, and more — gets its own campaign. So does each geographic market. This separation allows Google’s bidding algorithm to optimise independently for each segment’s conversion patterns, without the signals from a cheap, high-volume query contaminating the bidding logic for a premium, low-volume one.
The results are visible in the numbers. The General campaign, which covers the widest range of car hire queries, spent RM621,760 and returned 43,759 conversions at RM14.21 each. Meanwhile, the Van Starex campaign — far more specific — achieved the best CPA in the account at RM12.76 across 18,601 conversions. Same account, same platform, meaningfully different outcomes because of how the campaigns were separated.
The Core Domestic Engine: General, Van Starex, and Bus
Three campaigns form the backbone of this account, collectively accounting for RM934,617 in spend and 68,347 conversions — roughly 93% of all results.
| Campaign | Spend (RM) | Conversions | CPA (RM) | Lost IS (Budget) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| General (No Van, No Bus) | 621,760 | 43,759 | 14.21 | 17.66% |
| Van Starex | 237,358 | 18,601 | 12.76 | 14.84% |
| Bus | 75,499 | 5,987 | 12.61 | 34.92% |
The Bus campaign tells a particularly interesting story. It has the lowest CPA in the account at RM12.61 — even lower than Van Starex — yet it is losing 34.92% of available impressions due to budget constraints. That means nearly a third of the people searching for bus hire in Malaysia who could have seen this ad, did not. At RM12.61 per conversion, every one of those missed impressions represents a lead left on the table.
The Bus campaign has the lowest CPA in the account — RM12.61 — yet it is losing over a third of available impressions because the daily budget runs out. That is the clearest growth signal in this entire account.
The General campaign faces a similar constraint, with 17.66% of impressions lost to budget. These are not campaigns that need to be rebuilt or rethought. They need more runway. The conversion economics are already proven.
The Premium Tier: Vellfire, Alphard, and High-Value Hires
Premium vehicle campaigns operate differently. The Vellfire and Alphard campaign spent RM61,874 to generate 3,672 conversions at RM16.85 each — slightly above the account average, which is expected. Searchers looking for luxury vehicles are fewer in number, so Google has to work harder to find them, and bids tend to be more competitive.
What matters here is not just the CPA but what each conversion represents in real revenue. A confirmed Vellfire or Alphard booking is worth considerably more than a standard car hire. At RM16.85 per conversion, the return on ad spend for this segment is likely among the highest in the account, even if the raw CPA figure looks slightly less efficient.
This is why blended account-level CPAs can be misleading. The Vellfire campaign’s RM16.85 figure should not be benchmarked against the General campaign’s RM14.21 — they serve fundamentally different customer segments and carry different average booking values.
Regional Expansion: Singapore, Indonesia, and International
Three campaigns reach beyond Malaysia’s borders, and they reveal a promising, if early-stage, picture of regional demand.
| Campaign | Spend (RM) | Conversions | CPA (RM) | Impressions |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| MYSG Car (Malaysia–SG) | 10,463 | 456 | 22.94 | 240,854 |
| International | 9,865 | 291 | 33.90 | 13,251 |
| Indonesia | 1,470 | 78 | 18.85 | 2,091 |
The Singapore cross-border campaign is particularly interesting. With 240,854 impressions and 456 conversions at RM22.94 each, it has attracted meaningful volume despite the higher costs associated with serving regional traffic. The Indonesia campaign, while smaller, is converting at just RM18.85 — cheaper than the International campaign and close to core domestic rates.
The International campaign carries the highest CPA at RM33.90, which is understandable given the search volume limitations noted in the campaign status. International searches for Malaysian ground transport are inherently lower volume and harder to target precisely. That said, 291 conversions from a RM9,865 investment is a result worth maintaining.
Top-of-Page Visibility and What 75% Means in Practice
Across all campaigns, Brendan’s ads appeared in the top positions of Google search results 75.65% of the time. In competitive markets, this level of visibility does not come easily — it reflects both healthy bids and strong Quality Scores (a Google metric that rewards ad relevance and landing page experience).
In practical terms, top-of-page dominance means the brand is consistently the first thing a potential customer sees when they search for relevant transport services. At 75%, that visibility is near-dominant. Pushing it further would require either higher bids or landing page improvements — and given that the Bus campaign alone is losing 34.92% of impressions to budget, the more immediate opportunity is simply putting more fuel into campaigns that are already performing.
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What the Data Tells Us: A 16.65% blended conversion rate across RM1 million in spend is not something that happens by accident. It reflects consistent landing page relevance, well-matched keywords, and a bidding strategy (Maximise Conversions with Target CPA) that has had sufficient data to learn and stabilise. The account has reached a maturity level where the primary constraint is no longer strategy — it is budget.
Performance Max: A Supporting Role
The account also ran a Performance Max campaign for general transport, which reached 96,447 impressions and delivered 539 conversions at RM7.09 each — the lowest CPA in the entire account. Performance Max (or PMax) operates across Google’s full network of properties, including YouTube, Display, Gmail, and Search, using automated creative and bidding to find conversions wherever they are cheapest.
The RM7.09 CPA is striking, though PMax conversions should be read with some scepticism — the attribution can overlap with Search campaigns running simultaneously. Still, even at a conservative estimate, this campaign is contributing meaningfully to overall account performance.
The campaign is currently paused. Given its efficiency, this is worth revisiting — particularly if the goal is to maintain conversion volume while managing total spend.
Where Growth Lives: The Budget Ceiling Problem
The single most actionable finding from this account is not about strategy — it is about budget allocation. Three of the seven active campaigns are flagged as “Eligible (Limited)” due to budget constraints, meaning Google itself is signalling that these campaigns could be doing more work if given more daily budget.
The opportunity in numbers: The Bus campaign alone loses 34.92% of available impressions to budget. At its current conversion rate of ~7.93% (derived from its interactions-to-conversions ratio) and CPA of RM12.61, recovering those lost impressions could potentially add thousands of additional conversions annually — without changing a single ad or keyword.
The same logic applies to the General campaign (17.66% budget-lost IS) and the Vellfire/Alphard campaign (27.63% budget-lost IS). The campaigns have done the hard work of proving their efficiency. The next step is a straightforward budget conversation.
The ground transport market in Malaysia is competitive and seasonally influenced — corporate travel, airport transfers, school holidays, and public events all drive demand spikes. An account this well-structured is positioned to capture that demand. The question is whether the budget will be there when it arrives.
