How Apple’s iOS 14 Update Will Impact Your Facebook Ads
One of the many characteristics of Facebook Ads and digital advertising is how it’s consistently evolving. Recently, Apple released new changes to its app policies. These amendments were rolled out along with the iOS 14.5 update that happened last March 2021. It provided users with an opt-in prompt for every app which gives the option to consent to third-party sites like Facebook to track their user data.
Leaders in Digital makes sure to be updated with these changes to help plan out needed strategies and know any areas for concerns. We listed these updates and understand their effects on digital marketing and advertising on the Facebook platform.
iOS 14.5 Updates and How They Will Affect Advertisers
Mobile Web and App Advertising Changes – Apple has introduced back in 2018 the ‘SKAdNetwork’ API which is a concept that increases the privacy of users with installed mobile apps. Today, this concept is turned into reality. It will either restrict, aggregate, or delay app event data. The PCM (Private Click Measurement) protocol for web attribution is now responsible for restricting data that businesses and platforms can access.
Business Manager Tool Setup – this impacted the Facebook Business Manager interface due to the newly launched change in the design. It was done because Facebook cannot have a different interface for iOS and Android.
Measurement - due to PCM’s (Private Click Measurement) restriction, there will be delays in data access. A three-day delay on data display for data that will come from iOS 14.5 users when it comes to ad reporting. Having limited data makes running ad campaigns slightly inconvenient to advertisers.
Targeting and Optimization – there is now an eight-pixel cap event per domain for optimization in iOS 14.5 which means only a maximum of eight conversion events are available to use for advertisers. Advertisers need to evaluate eight events, with the most importance, that will be prioritized. The new iOS update hinders optimization, especially if data points are not enough. Small-scale advertisers take the most impact on this update as they don’t have many data points compared to big players. The size of retargeting audiences keeps shrinking as more and more users are updating their operating system to iOS 14.5.
Proactive ways to deal with the iOS 14.5 updates
Verify your domains with Facebook
Decide the eight events for conversion you’ll prioritize
Compare the relationship between 28-day to 7-day attribution
Miscellaneous actions:
Evaluate the impact of targeting and optimization changes on your campaigns.
Understand the real impact of Facebook and Instagram ads on your sales funnel.
Actions to take later
Keep focusing on strategic alliances with innovative data products: research for products that provide advertisers with privacy and safe access to data with events tied to various user IDs for ID management.
Look for cookie tracking alternatives: retargeting can still be facilitated through using any number of user-specific identifiers to target individuals, such as email addresses, phone numbers, etc. Encourage site login through improved authenticated experiences to increase the volume of persistent IDs.
Develop “value exchange” strategies – offer incentives to customers for sharing their data through “value exchange” strategies which will lead to an increase in the brand’s first-party data. Brands need to dig into their consumer’ psyche to come up with good experiences. Value exchange strategies can be used to your advantage if done right.
As digital marketing, Facebook and social media advertising continue to progress, these kinds of changes are expected to continue happening. Marketers keep finding solutions and ways to adjust to ensure that business will not be affected entirely. If you are looking for more assistance in building successful Facebook ad campaigns, Leaders in Digital would be delighted to offer a free strategy call to give you and your business the help needed. Reach out to us today here!