342 paid registrations. Six trial locations. A fresh Meta Ads account. Less than 10 days to build, test, optimise, and scale.
That was the challenge Kings Digital took on for Adams Cricket Academy, an Australia-based cricket academy operating in India in collaboration with Madan Lal Cricket Academy.
The campaign was not designed to attract casual enquiries.
It was built to reach serious young cricketers and families with the intent, interest, and financial capacity to consider an international cricket opportunity in Australia.
Within just 10 days, Kings Digital helped the academy generate 342 paid trial registrations, meet its planned target, and even close registrations early in selected cities because demand had already exceeded the required capacity.
Campaign Snapshot
Performance Highlights
Kings Digital builds complete acquisition systems — from funnel and payments to Meta Ads testing and scaling — under real-world deadlines.
Background
The Business Context
Adams Cricket Academy was organising a 10-day North Indian Schoolboys Cricket Tour to Australia in partnership with Madan Lal Cricket Academy.
The tour was positioned as a premium international cricket experience for young players.
The starting price for a player was approximately ₹3,90,045.
For parents accompanying their child on the tour, the package started at approximately ₹4,74,167.
Before the tour, the academy planned selection trials across six locations in India.
The registration fee for these trials was set at ₹599.
At first glance, the objective looked simple: generate between 300 and 350 trial registrations. However, delivering high-quality registrations required strategic lead generation services focused on attracting serious players and parents rather than low-intent enquiries.
But the actual marketing challenge was far more complex.
The Real Objective Was Not Cheap Leads
A ₹599 registration could not be treated like a standard low-cost lead-generation campaign.
The final tour involved a financial commitment of almost ₹4 lakh or more.
That meant the campaign needed to attract a very specific audience.
Kings Digital had to reach:
- Young cricketers genuinely serious about the sport
- Parents willing to invest in structured cricket opportunities
- Families interested in international exposure
- Prospects comfortable paying for a trial
- Families with the capacity to consider the final Australia tour
This made lead quality, intent, and relevance far more important than simply generating the lowest possible cost per click.
The campaign had to bring in people who were not merely curious.
It had to bring in potential participants.
The Deadline Made Everything More Challenging
Kings Digital had less than 10 days to get the campaign live and generate meaningful volume.
That short window would have been demanding even with a mature digital setup.
In this case, the digital ecosystem still needed substantial work.
The team had to build critical parts of the funnel while preparing the advertising campaign at the same time.
That included:
- Social media presence
- Website development
- Trial registration journey
- Payment integration
- Automated confirmation emails
- Conversion tracking
- Creative production
- Meta Ads testing
This was not simply an ad campaign.
It was a complete acquisition system built under pressure.
Challenges
The Roadblocks Behind the Campaign
Challenge 1: Building Trust Before Asking for Payment
Adams Cricket Academy needed a stronger digital presence for the Indian audience.
For parents, trust was critical.
They were being introduced to an international cricket opportunity through paid advertising, so the academy needed to look credible, organised, and professional at every touchpoint.
Kings Digital therefore worked across:
- Website
- Paid advertising
- Registration communication
The objective was to make the journey feel consistent from the first ad impression to the final payment confirmation.
Challenge 2: Creating the Registration Website From Scratch
There was no ready digital registration funnel for the trials.
Kings Digital had to create one urgently.
The website needed to explain:
- What the trials were about
- Who could participate
- Where the trials would take place
- How players could register
- What the fee included
- How payment would be completed
The website also had to support conversion tracking so the advertising team could measure actual registrations.
This made the website a crucial part of the performance strategy.
It was not built as a simple information page.
It was built as a conversion destination.
Challenge 3: Solving the Payment Problem
Another major obstacle was payment collection.
There was no existing payment gateway ready to process trial fees.
Without a smooth payment option, even strong advertising could have failed at the final step.
Kings Digital therefore implemented a Razorpay payment setup on an urgent basis.
This allowed interested players and parents to move from registration to payment without unnecessary delays.
The smoother the process, the lower the risk of users abandoning the journey before completing registration.
Challenge 4: Automating Registration Confirmation
Once a payment was successful, the user needed immediate reassurance.
Parents needed confirmation that:
- Payment was received
- Registration was successful
- Player details were recorded
- The trial entry had been confirmed
Kings Digital connected the Razorpay backend with the email software.
This created an automated communication system.
The final user journey became:
This reduced manual work for the client while creating a more professional experience for the registrants.
Challenge 5: A New Meta Ads Account With No Indian Market Data
The Meta Ads account had no meaningful historical data for the Indian market.
That meant there were no previous learnings available around:
- Audience behaviour
- Best-performing cities
- Strongest age groups
- Proven cricket interests
- Creative preferences
- Conversion benchmarks
The campaign had to create its own intelligence.
Kings Digital therefore avoided relying too heavily on assumptions.
Instead, the team used rapid experimentation and live conversion data to guide decisions.
Challenge 6: Constant Creative Revisions
The creative workload was significant.
Kings Digital developed:
- 50+ static creatives
- 15+ Reel variations
- 20+ Story creatives
- Multiple ad formats
- Location-specific versions
- Revised campaign versions
The process became even more demanding because trial venues and timings changed approximately three to four times.
Each change affected:
- Creative copy
- Visual information
- Campaign messaging
- Landing page details
- City-level advertisements
Despite these changes, the campaign could not afford to lose momentum.
The team had to maintain both speed and accuracy.
From website and payments to creative production and Meta Ads, Kings Digital moves quickly without sacrificing tracking or strategy.
Approach
The Kings Digital Strategy
Kings Digital divided the campaign into clear performance layers.
The strategy focused on delivering measurable results through Meta Ads while applying the same performance marketing principles used in Google Ads for lead generation, including conversion tracking, audience testing, creative optimisation, and continuous scaling.
- Building a reliable digital funnel
- Tracking real paid conversions
- Testing audiences aggressively
- Testing multiple creative formats
- Identifying winning combinations quickly
- Using conversion data to improve targeting
- Scaling only what was working
This approach helped the campaign become more efficient as the data improved.
How We Turned the Campaign Into a Conversion Engine
Step 1: Track the Metric That Actually Matters
Before launching the ads, Kings Digital installed the Meta Pixel across the website and relevant parts of the payment journey.
Custom conversions were also created.
The purpose was simple.
The campaign should not be judged primarily on:
- Likes
- Comments
- Reach
- Video views
- Click-through rate
- Website visits
Those numbers can be useful, but they were not the final business objective.
The true success metric was:
By tracking successful registrations, Kings Digital could see which campaigns were generating actual revenue-producing actions.
That made optimisation far more precise.
Step 2: Test Broad and Interest-Based Audiences
With no previous Indian market data, the team started by testing different audience structures.
These included:
- Broad targeting
- Cricket-related interest targeting
- City-wise targeting
- Multiple audience combinations
- Different creative and audience pairings
The aim was not to prove one targeting theory right.
The aim was to find the audience that actually converted.
This distinction mattered.
Campaign decisions were driven by real registration behaviour rather than assumptions about what cricket audiences should do.
Step 3: Test Images Against Videos
Kings Digital also tested multiple creative formats.
Static ads and video ads were run against different audiences.
This helped identify which combination of:
- Visual
- Message
- Format
- Audience
- Location
was producing stronger registrations.
Winning creatives were then scaled.
Weaker combinations were reduced or paused.
With a 10-day campaign window, fast optimisation was essential.
Step 4: Use City-Level Performance to Improve Efficiency
The trials were happening across six locations.
Performance therefore needed to be evaluated at a city level as well.
Some locations naturally generated better response than others.
Kings Digital used city-wise testing to understand:
- Where demand was stronger
- Which locations needed more budget
- Which creatives worked better locally
- Where registrations were filling faster
This allowed the team to avoid treating all six locations as identical markets.
Budget decisions could be made more intelligently.
The Turning Point: The First 100 Paid Registrations
The campaign became significantly more powerful after the first 100 registrations were successfully mapped through the Meta Pixel.
Kings Digital now had valuable first-party conversion data.
This data was used to create a Lookalike Audience.
Instead of relying only on broad targeting or cricket-related interests, Meta could now identify new users who shared behavioural characteristics with people who had already registered and paid.
This was a major shift.
After the Lookalike Audience Was Introduced:
- Cost of acquisition dropped
- Registration volume increased
- Audience quality improved
- Scaling became easier
- Budget efficiency improved
- Meta had stronger conversion signals
The campaign was no longer learning from clicks.
It was learning from actual customers.
Outcome
The Results
Within just 10 days, Kings Digital generated 342 paid cricket trial registrations.
The original objective was 300–350.
The campaign successfully reached the target within the planned window.
| Performance Metric | Result |
|---|---|
| Target Registrations | 300–350 |
| Paid Registrations | 342 |
| Campaign Duration | 10 Days |
| Approx. Ad Spend | ₹1,62,599 |
| Cost Per Registration | ₹475.43 |
| Trial Fee | ₹599 |
| Trial Revenue Generated | ₹2,04,858 |
| Trial Locations | 6 |
The approximate advertising spend was also reported as AUD 2,950.71, based on the exchange rate referenced for June 11, 2024.
Kings Digital uses Meta Pixel tracking, Lookalike Audiences, and continuous creative testing to scale campaigns on real conversion data.
The Bigger Value Behind the Campaign Results
The campaign generated ₹2,04,858 in trial registration revenue against an approximate Meta Ads spend of ₹1,62,599.
But evaluating the campaign only on trial-fee revenue would miss the bigger picture.
The ₹599 trial was the entry point.
The real commercial value was the ability to identify players who could potentially join a tour priced at around ₹3.9 lakh per player, with additional parent packages available.
That meant every relevant registration had potential downstream value far beyond ₹599.
The campaign therefore supported not just trial participation, but also the academy’s larger international tour objective.
The Strongest Validation Came From the Client
The most powerful result was not simply the number 342.
In some cities, registrations filled faster than expected.
The response became strong enough that Adams Cricket Academy asked Kings Digital to stop registrations for selected locations before the planned campaign end.
The reason was simple.
The academy had already received enough trial participants.
In certain markets, further advertising was no longer required.
That is a very different problem from struggling to generate demand.
It means the campaign had created more response than the available capacity required.
Behind the Campaign
Inside the Campaign with Ritesh Agarwal
Ritesh Agarwal, Founder of Kings Digital, personally handled the project and was closely involved in the strategy, setup, creative direction, campaign execution, and optimisation.
The most important thing for us was understanding that this was not a normal lead-generation campaign. The final opportunity involved a significant financial commitment, so getting the cheapest lead was never the objective. We needed serious families with genuine intent.
He further explains:
We had less than 10 days, a fresh Meta account for the Indian market, no established conversion data, changing trial locations, and a registration system that still had to be built. That meant we had to move fast without making careless decisions.
According to him, the first major improvement came when the campaign started generating meaningful conversion data.
Once we crossed the first 100 paid registrations, we had enough information to build stronger Lookalike Audiences. That helped us reduce acquisition costs and scale registrations faster.
For Kings Digital, the clearest indication of success came from the client itself.
When a client asks you to stop registrations in certain cities because they have already received enough participants, that is a powerful validation. It means the marketing did not just generate attention. It created actual demand.
Breakdown
What Made the Campaign Work?
The Funnel Was Built Around Conversion: The campaign did not send traffic into an incomplete journey. Website, registration, payment, and confirmation were connected properly.
Success Was Measured Through Paid Registrations: This kept optimisation aligned with the business goal.
Testing Was Continuous: Different audiences, cities, images, videos, and creative versions were tested.
Real Customer Data Improved Targeting: The Lookalike Audience was based on actual registrants, not assumptions.
Winning Campaigns Were Scaled Quickly: The team did not waste time waiting for weak ad sets to improve.
Operations and Marketing Worked Together: Changes in trial locations and timings were handled without disrupting campaign momentum.
Key Lessons From the Campaign
The Adams Cricket Academy project offers several valuable lessons for performance marketers.
Lead Quality Matters More Than Lead Volume: For premium products and services, low-cost enquiries can easily become a vanity metric. The right audience is far more valuable.
Paid Ads Need a Strong Funnel: A great Meta Ads campaign cannot compensate for poor registration, confusing payments, or weak communication.
Conversion Tracking Changes Decision-Making: Tracking paid registrations gave Kings Digital a much clearer view of what was actually working.
First-Party Data Becomes More Valuable as the Campaign Grows: The first registrations did more than generate revenue. They improved future targeting.
Creative Volume Creates Better Learning: Testing many creative versions provided more opportunities to discover stronger combinations.
Speed Is Valuable Only When It Is Structured: Fast campaigns can still be strategic. The key is to move quickly while keeping tracking, testing, and optimisation disciplined.
Summary
Final Outcome
In less than 10 days, Kings Digital helped Adams Cricket Academy move from a limited digital setup to a functioning paid acquisition system.
The campaign delivered:
- 342 paid cricket trial registrations
- ₹2,04,858 in trial fee revenue
- ₹475.43 cost per registration
- 300–350 registration target achieved
- Six locations covered
- 50+ creative variations tested
- Lookalike Audiences built from real conversion data
- Registrations stopped early in selected cities
- More qualified players available for Australia tour selection
The real achievement was not simply reaching a registration target.
It was creating a campaign where strategy, creative testing, tracking, technology, automation, and paid media all worked together to produce a measurable business outcome.
That is what made the Adam’s Cricket Academy campaign a strong performance marketing case study for Kings Digital, demonstrating how strategy, technology, and optimisation can generate measurable business growth.
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Common Questions
Frequently Asked Questions
Kings Digital combined Meta Ads, conversion tracking, creative testing, city-wise targeting, Razorpay integration, and Lookalike Audiences to scale paid registrations efficiently.
A strong strategy combines audience testing, compelling creatives, conversion-focused landing pages, payment integration, tracking, and continuous optimisation based on actual registrations.
Sports academies can generate more paid registrations through targeted Meta Ads, clear landing pages, simple payments, trust-building content, and accurate conversion tracking.
Lookalike Audiences help Meta find users similar to existing converters, improving audience relevance, lowering acquisition costs, and increasing conversion potential significantly.
Businesses should track paid conversions, cost per acquisition, revenue, audience quality, creative performance, funnel drop-offs, and overall return on advertising investment.