Driving 2× Online Sales Through Performance and Media Integration: Motul Case Study 

Many e-commerce projects face the same challenge: performance campaigns deliver consistent results, but growth gradually slows down.

Once the high-intent audience is reached, increasing budgets no longer drives additional sales and mainly increases competition for the same audience.

Motul, a global automotive lubricants brand, ran into this exact limitation. Despite strong offline brand awareness and a well-established performance setup, online sales began to plateau as the existing audience had already been largely captured.

Campaigns continued to convert, but there was little new demand.

To scale sales without sacrificing efficiency, we built a model in which media drives demand, while performance campaigns convert it.

Challenge

At the beginning of 2025, Motul’s e-commerce operations already had a well-established performance setup across key channels:

• Google Search
• Google Shopping
• Performance Max
• Meta Ads

Campaigns delivered consistent and predictable results. In March, they generated 344 transactions with a 1.04% conversion rate.

Operationally, this was a solid baseline. From a business perspective, however, it marked a growth ceiling — a common limitation for e-commerce projects in established categories.

Why Performance Stopped Scaling

The issue was not campaign execution. The limitation was in how the model worked.

• Lack of new demand entering the funnel 

Performance channels were doing their job — effectively converting users already in the market. As a result, transaction volume was directly tied to the number of users actively searching for the product.

• Risk of CPA growth when scaling

Increasing budgets did not unlock new growth. It simply meant competing for the same audience. As a result, sales growth slowed down, while CPA started to rise.

• Multi-touch purchase journey 

In the automotive category, users rarely convert after the first interaction. They see an ad, compare options, read product details, and return later through search or marketplaces. Conversion is the result of multiple touchpoints, not a single click.

• Attribution limitations

A last-click attribution model assigns conversions to the channel that drove the final interaction before purchase. All previous touchpoints — including media campaigns — weren’t reflected in performance data, even though they played a key role in driving demand.

Strategy: Aligning Demand and Conversion

Our goal wasn’t just to optimize campaigns, but to build a system that could scale sales sustainably.

We built a model in which upper- and lower-funnel activities were designed to work together as a single system:

• Performance campaigns convert existing demand
• Media campaigns expand reach and make users more likely to choose the brand
• Cross-channel analytics provide visibility into the full user journey

The implementation was built around 3 key steps:

1. Optimizing the performance setup
2. Launching media campaigns aligned with seasonal demand
3. Measuring channel impact using cross-channel analytics

Step 1. Performance Optimization

We focused not on individual tools, but on optimizing the overall system structure.

Key changes included:

• Redefining the role of each channel across the funnel
• Expanding query coverage in Search
• Strengthening Google Shopping and Performance Max as the primary e-commerce drivers
• Using Meta to re-engage returning users
• Scaling budgets gradually while maintaining CPA control

As a result, the performance setup became more efficient. Conversion rates steadily improved, reaching around 2.0% during peak periods — nearly double the initial level.

At the same time, it was clear that sustaining further growth would require expanding the upper funnel.

Step 2. Media as a Demand Driver

To understand the real contribution of media to sales, we implemented Campaign Manager.

This allowed us to track the full user journey:

Exposure to video or display ads → return via Search / Shopping / Performance Max → transaction

This enabled us to move beyond click-based metrics and evaluate the true impact of paid media on conversions.

Media Strategy

For Motul, media wasn’t used solely to maximize reach. The goal was to create meaningful interactions with potential buyers and support performance channels.

We used a mix of formats with different levels of engagement:

• YouTube TrueView In-stream — the primary video format for user engagement
• Bumper Ads — short-form videos to increase frequency
• DV360 in-stream video and display banners — maintaining a consistent brand presence across digital channels

This combination allowed us to build brand awareness, reinforce messaging, and bring users back into the performance funnel with higher purchase intent.

Implementation: Two Media Flights

Media activity was structured around two media flights:

• Spring — scaling reach
• Autumn — reinforcing demand with more targeted campaigns 

This approach helped avoid ad fatigue and stay active during periods of rising demand.

Spring Flight: Demand Generation

The first launch focused on the upper funnel and delivered strong, consistent growth across key metrics:

• Sales — +50% vs. March
• Impressions — +50%
• Cookie-based reach — +120%
• Video views — +119%
• CPM — -50%

Media campaigns increased brand awareness, while performance campaigns began capturing higher-intent users.

As early as April, transactions reached 516, approximately 50% higher than in March.

Post-Campaign: A New Demand Level

Importantly, performance remained above baseline even after the campaign ended.

In May, sales remained 47% higher than in March. The uplift plateaued, becoming the new baseline for further growth.

Summer: Scaling Performance

In the following months, performance continued to grow even without active media support:

• June — 741 transactions
• July — 801 transactions
• August — 790 transactions

Overall, the system scaled from around 340 transactions to a stable level of 750-800 per month.

The spring media flight drove this growth by creating new demand that performance campaigns could then convert at scale.

Autumn Flight: Strengthening Demand

We ran the second flight, relying on a stable performance baseline. The goal was to support brand choice and maintain conversion volume.

Campaign results:

• Video impressions — +6%
• Clicks — +40%
• CTR — +30%
• CPM — -14%

By this stage, the audience was already familiar with the brand, which led to stronger engagement with the ads.

Business Results

Aligning performance and media delivered strong, measurable growth across key metrics:

• Transactions — 2× vs. baseline
• Conversion rate — from 1.04% to ~2.0%
• Scalable growth without losing control of CPA

Post-View and Post-Click Impact

Media campaigns rarely drive direct conversions. Their primary role is to introduce the brand and bring users back into performance channels, where conversions happen.

That is why our analysis went beyond clicks to include both post-view and post-click interactions. This allowed us to assess the true impact of media on sales.

Key Takeaway

The Motul case shows that in competitive markets, there is a natural limit to how far performance alone can scale.

Sustainable growth emerges when:

• Media campaigns drive demand
• Performance channels capture and convert it efficiently
• Analytics provides visibility into the full user journey

As a result, Motul moved from siloed campaigns to a unified marketing system that enabled stable e-commerce growth.