Apple’s recent announcement of the iOS 14 changes is going to have some significant changes to the way businesses can advertise on Facebook.
This matters for a few reasons:
- Website custom audiences are anticipated to decline as there will be fewer chances to retarget due to less tracked activity and data.
- Decreased simplicity and opportunity to personalise ads for individuals. This is due to current advertising features on Facebook like dynamic advertising, no longer utilising the data as effectively as it once was.
- Facebook’s ability to attribute events will be considerably affected. As a result, both reporting and attribution are going to be impacted.
*Sighs of defeat*
Our job [and the reason you hire a digital marketing agency] is to navigate these changes and steer your ads in the right direction.
*Sighs of relief*
Here are a few things you must know about these updates.
- Everyone is on an even playing field, and the changes impact every single business (you’re not alone, phew!)
- Our technical team members have already started making changes to your account structure so we can continue to see results from your ad campaigns.
So, for those playing at home interested in learning more about the changes and the work we are doing, keep on reading.
Complete domain verification
Domain Verification provides a way for us to claim ownership of our clients’ domain in Business Manager. This ownership allows us to control the editing privileges of links and other content. All businesses should verify their domain as a best practice.
Once we have verified the domain, we can use an allow/deny list to see and control who can edit ad links to the domain and control which 3rd-party ads can edit links to the domain.
Plan to operate with eight conversion events per domain
Another recent update is that we can configure only up to eight unique conversion events per website domain that can be used for campaign optimisation.
Ad sets optimising for a conversion event that’s no longer available will be paused.
Initial configuration and how to change it
Following the previous point, Facebook will initially configure the conversion events that they believe are the most relevant to the business based on the activity. All other events will be made inactive for campaign optimisation.
Conversions API
Conversions API is a Facebook Business tool that lets you share key web and offline events or customer actions directly from your server to Facebook (similar to cookies).
Reporting limitations
Similar limitations will apply to the measurement of some web conversion events because of reporting limitations of iOS 14 devices. The following restrictions are expected across Ads Manager, ads reporting, and the Ads Insights API.
- Delayed reporting: Web conversion events will be reported based on the time the conversions occur and not the associated ad impressions.
- Estimated results: For web conversion events, statistical modelling may be used to account for conversions from iOS 14 users.
- No support for breakdowns: For both app and web conversions, delivery and action breakdowns, such as age, gender, region and placement will not be supported.
- Changes to account attribution window settings: Once Apple enforces their iOS 14 requirements, the attribution window for all new or active ad campaigns will be set at the ad set level rather than at the account level.
The new ad set attribution setting
This ad set level attribution setting ensures that the conversions measured are the same ones used to inform campaign optimisation and allow for increased flexibility and clarity when analysing ad performance.
Additionally, a 7-day click window will be set as the default for all new or active ad campaigns (other than iOS 14 app install campaigns).
Furthermore, 28-day click-through, 28-day view-through and 7-day view-through attribution windows will not be supported for active campaigns. However, inactive campaigns will still report using the legacy account-level attribution window, and historical data for the attribution windows that are no longer supported will continue to remain accessible via our Ads Insights API.
Targeting limitations
As more people opt-out of tracking on iOS 14 devices, website Custom Audiences may decrease.
SO… Now that a whole lot of “what does this mean” has been made into seven nice and easy(er)-to-understand points, what next?
We will leave you to get going on making the necessary changes to your Facebook ads so your business can keep on thriving in this ever-evolving world that is, technology. Otherwise, our whiz-bang digital team are here to help and can take care of all the backends, giving you peace of mind knowing your Facebook ads won’t stop flourishing.
When you’re ready, drop us a line at [email protected]
