Wash U and Wash Associates Drive Brand Awareness and Foot Traffic Across Locations
Overview
Consumer Choice is Shaping Demand
Despite strong demand, the car wash industry is increasingly competitive, with nearly 60,000 businesses across the U.S. and more than 8 million vehicles washed daily (IBISWorld). While the category generates over $15 billion annually and continues to grow through convenience-driven models, proximity alone no longer guarantees success.
Consumers increasingly discover and choose car washes digitally, where visibility and brand recall influence decisions in a crowded field of similar options. As competition intensifies and customer attention fragments, even high-performing car washes must actively work to stay top of mind, defend market share, and win the moment of choice before the competition does.
To support this objective, Wash U Car Wash and its affiliated brand, Wash Associates, sought a programmatic partner that could deliver not only reach but clear, defensible measurement. With multiple locations and high repeat-purchase behavior, the brands required precise attribution of in-store visits and conversions to media exposure, moving beyond modeled estimates based on broad conversion zones used by their former partner.
The car wash brands decided to leverage Simpli.fi’s granular location-based targeting and advanced measurement capabilities to build brand awareness in two local markets, increase foot traffic to their car washes, and accurately track conversions. Overall, the brand wanted to achieve a low Cost Per Action (CPA) for in-person foot traffic and drive clicks to their websites.
Creating Brand Awareness Around Storefronts
To promote brand awareness, Wash U and Wash Associates leveraged Simpli.fi’s Addressable Geo-Fencing solution to create custom household-level audiences within 1-2-mile radii from various locations across Illinois and Tennessee. By precisely mapping the areas around each storefront, the advertiser identified thousands of households within each state:
- Within Chicago – 107,686 parcels
- Within four pre-defined ZIP Codes in Tennessee – 52,945
Simpli.fi’s Addressable Geo-Fencing solution then used GPS data paired with parcel boundaries to match each address to the exact physical location, shape, and size of the property. The system then applied location intelligence to automatically build target zones around each household and delivered display ads to all connected devices in the home, amplifying brand awareness and reinforcing proximity to nearby car wash locations.
Driving Foot Traffic Through Competitor Conquesting
Next, Wash U and Wash Associates expanded their digital footprint by implementing Geo-Fencing to target users who were actively using nearby competitor locations or visiting category-relevant businesses such as auto retailers, oil change shops, DMVs, and more.
The car washes utilized Simpli.fi’s Geo-Fence Finder Tool to identify 40 locations in Chicago and 59 locations within the four specified ZIP codes in Tennessee. The Simpli.fi team then built target fences around the exact shape and size of each location to capture users who visited the competitor or related storefronts. The campaign then served display ads to these shoppers for up to thirty days following
their initial in-store visit.
To track visits to the Wash U and Wash Associates locations, the team drew precise Conversion Zones around the 11 Wash U storefronts in Chicago and the 4 Wash Associates storefronts in Tennessee. Therefore, when a user visited one of the advertiser’s stores after being served an ad, they counted as an offline conversion.
Increasing Efficiencies with Omnichannel Consolidation
To further strengthen the campaign, the advertiser integrated Google Search and Meta alongside programmatic display, creating a more robust full-funnel marketing approach. This also drove cost-saving efficiencies across search and social, delivering base-level results, such as impressions, clicks, and CTR, on par with those of previous partners while reallocating a portion of the former omnichannel budget to Simpli.fi’s location-based offerings. By reaching consumers across multiple touchpoints, the brand was able to boost both awareness and customer engagement.
Simpli.fi Increases In-Person Visits
The three-month campaign achieved a low Cost Per Action (CPA) of $29.82 for the competitor Geo-Fencing tactic, outperforming the advertiser’s $50 goal. The brand awareness Addressable Geo-Fences also served more than 15.5 million impressions and drove more than 11,000 ad clicks. Altogether, the location-based solutions garnered more than 1,300 in-person visits to the 15 car wash locations across Illinois and Tennessee.
Additionally, the brand awareness Google Search and Meta campaigns delivered nearly 2 million impressions and drove more than 19,000 clicks, with average CTRs of 0.28% on Meta and 9.33% on Google Search, well above industry benchmarks. The Google Search campaign also measured an additional 5,246 “Get Directions” conversions, despite tracking beginning late in the first month.
Both Wash U and Wash Associates plan to continue leveraging Simpli.fi’s programmatic and omnichannel solutions to effectively reach and convert new customers. The advertiser and their Simpli.fi team are also focused on exploring additional attribution options across their social and search solutions to further maximize measurement and optimize campaign performance.