How Star Media Cut Their Cost Per Lead by 74%

For 20 years, Star Media Platinum sold cinema advertising one door at a time. We built its first digital sales channel on Meta, and the pilot delivered so many quality enquiries it had to be switched off so the sales team could keep up. Now it’s a national playbook, live across six cinema markets in under six months.

The Challenge

Every Lead, One Door at a Time

Star Media Platinum sells on-screen cinema advertising to local businesses, putting their brand in front of audiences in cinemas across Australia. For 20 years, its team has helped local owners reach their community on the big screen.

Almost all new business came from door knocking. There was no digital program, no online enquiry flow and no data on what a lead should cost.

Local business owners don't go looking for cinema advertising, they go looking for more customers, and Star Media ranked for just one keyword in Australia.

The Approach

Start with the Symptom, Not the Channel

We reached local owners on Meta, in their own town, with a message about growth rather than media. Four principles guided the work:

Local by design: One campaign per cinema market.
Pilot, learn, rotate: Roughly four-week pilots, with learnings carried into the next market.
Make it easy to say yes: Instant Forms that take seconds to complete.
Quality over volume: Optimised to Star Media’s own definition of a qualified lead.

Six Local Campaigns

Between April and September 2026 we ran six Meta lead generation campaigns: Newcastle, Sydney, Melbourne, Hobart, Tuggeranong and Cairns.

Leads Straight to Sales

Instant Form leads went straight to the sales team, so every enquiry could be followed up while interest was fresh.

Staged Rollout & Reporting

Each rollout was staged so learnings carried from one market to the next, and cost per lead was reported by market, month and audience.

Introducing a digital pipeline into our sales strategy was very new territory for us. The team at Intender made the transition straightforward, providing practical guidance and their brilliant expertise, continually checking in, and responses to any enquiry we had was prompt and made all the difference. We’ve been absolutely sold on this new initiative and thrilled to see the process already contributing to new sales opportunities.

—

Peter Skillman

,

Director and CEO

-

Star Media Platinum

Platform Capabilities

The Results

From Zero Digital Leads to a National Pipeline

In under six months, Star Media went from zero digital leads to a sales pipeline it could switch on in any cinema market.

74%

drop in cost per lead in month one

Leads became 3.8x cheaper within a month of launch, as the metro markets went live.

58%

of leads from the core 35 to 54 buyer

58% of leads came from business owners aged 35 to 54, at a cost per lead 14% below the program average.

77%

lower cost per lead in Melbourne than at launch

Sydney and Melbourne delivered 69% of enquiries at a cost per lead 32% below the program average, with Melbourne the standout.

Additional outcomes

74% drop in cost per lead in the first month, as the metro markets launched.
69% of enquiries came from Sydney and Melbourne, at a cost per lead 32% below the program average, with Melbourne the standout at 45% below average.
31% of enquiries came from four regional markets, proving the playbook works in smaller regional audiences too.
58% of leads came from business owners aged 35 to 54, at a cost per lead 14% below the program average.
6 cinema markets live in under six months.

Star Media now has something door knocking could never give it: a repeatable, measurable way to create demand in any cinema market, with real cost per lead benchmarks behind every new rollout.

Want to collab?

We’d love to help your brand reach its performance goals. Reach out and we’ll organise an initial strategic session.

More Case Studies From Intender

Control Hire

Discover how Control Hire doubled their leads through an SEO strategy based on strategic content & in-depth audience insights.

Bi-Rite

See how Bi-Rite aligned its category pages with search demand to grow organic traffic, AI visibility and Store Locator actions.