Digital Advertising: Northside ISD
The challenge
Northside ISD in San Antonio, Texas, faced a challenge common for today’s school districts: declining student enrollment. The district knew it had to get innovative and, for the first time, began offering open enrollment in the 2025-26 school year to families who live outside of district boundaries. They came to CESO Communications to collaborate on a digital advertising campaign to get the word out and tell their story.
Our approach
CESO partnered closely with district leadership to develop messaging and launch a successful Google Search campaign that highlighted the district’s selling points under the tagline “Excellence Without Boundaries,” with a focus on the new open enrollment offering. Northside ISD already had quality storytelling in its regular communications, including an informative and user-friendly website, so CESO’s role was to bring that to the forefront of prospective families’ minds and to the top of their Google searches.
The campaign ran for a short time during the summer of 2025 and garnered more than 2,700 ad clicks, as well as 220 phone calls placed directly to the enrollment office from clicking the ads. During this time, the campaign landing page also received over 12,600 views.
Our impact
Thanks to the strong collaboration between CESO and Northside ISD, the district enrolled more than 300 students through open enrollment for the 2025-26 school year, generating $2.7 million in new revenue from this campaign alone – a monumental payoff for the investment in the campaign itself.
During the course of this campaign, CESO also conducted research to develop a report that revealed just how many students the district was losing each year, and where they were going. We discovered that what the district needed most was a way to “stop the bleed” and win families back.
Following the success of the open enrollment campaign, Northside ISD partnered with CESO for a strategic Win Back campaign, complete with a competitive analysis. This work is ongoing.
What started as one challenge ultimately uncovered a new opportunity. The CESO team will always stand ready to dive deep into the root of districts’ challenges and deliver ongoing support to achieve real solutions.
Services provided
2025-present