Below is the transcript from the video deep dive on upcoming changes to Apple iOS 14 and Facebook advertising.
Video Transcript:
MARCUS: Hello all. Marcus Dennis here from Global Marketing. Joining me today is Jessica Leachman, also from Global Marketing and Patience Cook from our Global Media Partner, Found Search Marketing.
JESSICA: Hi everyone.
PATIENCE: Thanks for having me.
MARCUS: The reason we are making this video is that we have some urgent news for any affiliate who owns a Facebook or Instagram account and anyone who uses either in an advertising capacity. If that is you, please watch this video and there are important actions for you. Let me start with some back story. Last year, Apple announced big changes would be coming with iOS version 14. They plan to implement some major data privacy changes. Now, not all of those changes have not taken place yet. The most concerning part of this update is that in some upcoming iOS 14 update (we don’t know when) users will be asked to opt In or Out of app data tracking and permissions. This could have some dramatic effects on apps and advertising.
JESSICA: You may have seen in the news that Facebook & Apple have opposing views on this policy. We do not have an opinion on this, however this change requires us to establish stronger ownership over our Facebook Business Account and campaign tracking on our sites. Every Facebook page and every site owner must verify ownership of their Facebook Business Manager account.
PATIENCE: Here is what the policy will do… Facebook and Instagram are apps… and they sit on the iPhone iOS, just like any other app like mySugr, Roche Home, or Salesforce. Apple is requiring all apps to display the prompt you see here. This prompt allows customers to opt in or out of some app tracking permissions. The highlighted area is where the app name will be - Facebook or Instagram. Apple will also allow users to see all the data that an app is tracking
PATIENCE: If the customer chooses “Allow”, then nothing changes** But… If the customer chooses “Not to Allow Tracking”, then both the amount of data and types of data coming back to Facebook... and then to Roche as an advertiser... will be greatly reduced.
** Note - actually there are changes for both opt in and opt out. Please see below for more details.
MARCUS: The new policy will...
- Limit the kind of data we can get which effects conversion tracking and attribution,
- Reduce how specific the data is, data will be aggregated (which effects optimizations and audiences),
- And it will delay or close the window for when we will get it (reporting).
MARCUS: Let’s look at the first one…the kind of data we can get. If a user chooses NO and does not allow the tracking. All Facebook and Instagram campaigns on iOS/Apple mobile devices will only see “last click” events. That means that we may lose visibility to the customer activity - clicks and journey behavior - that leads up to that last click.
PATIENCE: This is across all campaigns that are running ads on mobile devices. Since about 95% of our traffic comes from the Facebook and Instagram mobile apps, we anticipate we'll see a drop in paid media performance.
MARCUS: It will not also support app-to-web conversion measurement... That means if we run a campaign on Facebook or Instagram and we ask a person to click “Learn More” and visit our Accu-Chek landing page, then that person goes watches a video, then begins to fill out a lead form (another event) or clicks on add-to-cart (another event) or a buy now button (another event)... Facebook may only report on the highest-ranking event (the buy now button click). It may not measure any of the prior events the person took on that page.
JESSICA: That is a lot of detail and you may not be sure how this pertains to you. Well tune back in and listen closely. This is where we need to take action. Facebook is requiring that all Facebook Business Manager accounts “verify” their domains. Only ONE business manager account can do this and when that happens, that person or agency controls what is tracked. It is a critical step that we - Roche - establish ownership of our own Business Manager accounts versus local agencies or individual employees. Here’s why.
MARCUS: If a person opts in, advertisers, like us, will only be able to optimize to 8 events per domain. So, if our home page is tracking lots of events like:
- Landing page view event
- Video view event
- Link to mySugr app download event
- Add to cart event
- Purchase event
- Newsletter sign up event
- PDF Download
- Lead Form Fills
- Registration
Any campaign that optimizes for other events outside the 8 will be automatically paused by Facebook. If a person opts out, Facebook will get data on only ONE tracked event after an ad click. That is even if the person did other trackable things on the site.
MARCUS: Now on the bright side, each country site accu-chek.com, accu-chek.in, accu-chek.de… are all separate domains and will each have 8 events. But if an affiliate is working with multiple agencies using these events on Facebook, we will quickly hit the 8 event limit.
JESSICA: The critical part of this is that WE - Roche need to have the top level governance and ownership of what is tracked. We do not want any local agency determining for us what can and cannot be tracked. Despite good relationships with agencies, we have to have control over our own data and business decisions.
PATIENCE: The new policy will also cause delays in reporting and a lot less data in that reporting. If Roche wants us to change one of the 8 events it’s tracking, we will have to wait 1 to 3 days before running an optimized campaign toward that event. This will delay our ability to launch campaigns or make these changes quickly. Also, the window of capturing events is closing from a possible 28 day window to 1. If a person sees our ad but converts later than 1 day, we won’t see it. Conversions might still happen due to seeing that ad, but we won’t see that data. We will also see an impact in our audience targeting. Where we once could create an audience in Facebook to exclude current customers from seeing our ads, we can no longer do that because Apple will force aggregating data. So, there is less control and people may see our ads even after being a customer.
MARCUS: We will not see the audience breakdowns, who is interacting with our campaigns, like we used to. Less data will be collected which means audiences will be smaller and less effective. We can still target by interests and demographics. We can also still create “custom audiences” based on the actions people have taken before, but we will be limited since we’re only able to see the final event someone took on the site. It’s very likely that audience sizes will go down and targeting will be less accurate. So, that was a lot of information. Now what do we have to do about this? What are the next steps to ensure Roche business is not negatively impacted more than it has to be? And that Roche is not dependent on local agencies to define business objectives.
JESSICA: We need to take some actions to prepare for this. Global Marketing will help “Verify the domain” of affiliate Facebook pages under ONE Roche controlled business manager account. That will ensure that Roche is the primary owner. This is a critical first step. The other things we need to do cannot move unless this is done first.
MARCUS: Secondly, we are asking that every affiliate who uses Facebook or Instagram to contact Global Marketing with the following information…
- List of all agencies who are placing tracking or event pixels on your website. This includes any agencies for paid media or social media.
- We need a list of the events currently being tracked.
- And a recommendation from you on what events are most critical to your business.
MARCUS: Next, Global Marketing will work with you and those agencies to identify what events will be tracked and what other processes need to be in place to work together smoothly. The goal is that no campaigns are paused or data stops coming in. To ensure we do what is best for Roche, we are going to have to create some inter-agency plans and work together. It may take some meetings with multiple agencies or multiple affiliates to get a plan together, but we can do it.