**Note - On April 20, 2021, Apple confirmed that the release of general availability of iOS 14.5 will begin next week, and it will start requiring apps in the App Store to obtain permission to “track” users across apps and websites owned by third parties for advertising and measurement purposes through its App Tracking Transparency framework.
In line with the general availability of iOS 14.5 -- next week (week of April 26) -- Facebook will begin rollout of the new advertiser experiences and measurement protocols, including Apple’s SKAdNetwork API (SKAN) and Facebook’s Aggregated Event Measurement (AEM). Once the specific date of the general availability release of 14.5 is confirmed, Facebook will establish the rollout timing of its new experiences and communicate this timing.
With the release of general availability of iOS 14.5 and Apple’s prompt enforcement, we can expect to see changes in our business and advertising tools, campaign set up, targeting, delivery, measurement, and reporting.
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These frequently asked questions may help you understand the details of the upcoming changes to Apple iOS and Facebook / Instagram advertising. Facebook has been clear that it anticipates the new policy will decrease audience sizes, increase in overlap between audience segments (double serving of ads), and reported conversions will be fewer (conversion attribution window shorter).
Q - When will Apple iOS launch the new pop up?
A - Apple has not released it to date and has not given any definitive launch date. iOS 14.5 is now available as a developer beta. Apple doesn't publicly announce when it will release a new version of iOS, but since the developer beta for iOS 14.5 became available on Feb 1st. Releases come out roughly once a month. It is reasonable to think that the final version of iOS 14.5 will be sometime in February. We still do not know if this will be the version that triggers the new policy. Apple has said the roll out broadly in early spring.
Q - Does this apply only to Apple devices? What about Android devices?
A - Although this is being driven by Apple, it may affect all mobile devices as time goes on. Though the update is only on Apple devices, Facebook is making global changes to its ad platform in preparation. Android devices should not be immediately affected, but we'll see.
Q - Who controls the Facebook Business Manager? What process is there if changes are needed for events or adding a local agency to the account?
A - Only a Roche person can verify the domain. It is important that a Roche person be the owner of the Business Manager account. An agency cannot verify the domain for you. You can assign other Business Manager Accounts as "Partners" on your domain. Once the domain is verified, the affiliate can choose which local agency Business Manager accounts they want to link to the page.
Whomever verifies the domain establishes control of the trackable events. If an affiliate wants to change an event, the owner of the account has to initiate it. Any change to the event will initiate a 1 to 3 day delay before running an optimized campaign toward that changed event.
Q - What if I don't have a Business Manager account?
A - We can help you set one up. Click here for instructions on How to create your Facebook Business Manager Account.
Q - If I verify the Facebook Business Manager account, does that block my local agency from managing campaigns?
A - No. You can assign other Business Manager Accounts as "Partners" on your domain. Once the domain is verified, the affiliate can choose which local agency Business Manager accounts they want to link to the page.
Q - Can I let my local agency verify the domain?
A - An agency cannot verify the domain for you.
Q - What is domain verification?
A - Businesses claim ownership of their domains in Facebook Business Manager. Domain Verification is the process of telling Facebook that you own the website that you are sending ads to. Through the process, you’ll add a bit of code to your website, which Facebook will search for in order to verify it on their side. Once it’s verified, you can associate your Facebook page with your verified domain so that Facebook knows it’s okay for that page to edit link previews from that website. Domain verification requires the webmaster for your domain to place a special code on your website. We are asking that all affiliates work with global to complete this process. This ensures that Roche has upper level governance for the account over any local agencies.
Q - How is it done?
A - You can watch this video from Facebook. The steps are outlined below. A Roche person needs to:
- Open Facebook Business Manager.
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Click on Business Settings button in the upper right corner.
- In Business Settings, click on Brand Safety tab in the left side panel and then choose Domains from the left navigation list.
- Click on the Add button, and enter your domain (the site URL) in the pop-up.
- If you have more that one domain listed, select the one you wish to confirm ownership.
- Continue with one of the two methods listed below.
Verifying your domain
There are two methods to verify your Facebook page - DNS Verification and HTML file upload - both described below.
DNS Verification
If you choose this method, you’ll need to upload a .txt file to your webhost.
- First, you’ll need to grab the TXT record from Facebook Business Manager. You can do this by clicking on the DNS Verification tab.
- Next, log into your domain provider account and head over to the DNS records section.
- Add the TXT entry that you copied from Facebook, to your DNS record. You may need to add "facebook-domain-verification=" before the TXT code.
- Once the changes have propagated across your domain's web servers, go back to Facebook Business Manager
- Click the Verify button at the bottom of the DNS Verification tab for the selected domain. Typically, this change only takes a few minutes to occur, but there are cases where it may take up to 72 hours. You'll notice that the status will display as Verified (with a green dot) once this has been completed.
- Leave the TXT entry in your DNS record, as it may be checked periodically for verification purposes.
HTML file upload
The other option is to verify your domain by uploading an HTML file to your site.
- Click on the HTML File Upload tab.
- Download the HTML verification file.
- Upload this file to the root directory of your website. You'll be able to see that it's uploading, at the link provided in the HTML File Upload tab.
- Once the file has finished uploading, click the Verify button at the bottom of the page. Typically, this change only takes a few minutes to occur, but there are cases where it may take up to 72 hours.
- You'll notice that the status will display as Verified (with a green dot) once this has been completed.
- Leave the HTML verification file in your website's root directory, as it may be checked periodically for verification purposes.
Assigning your Facebook page to your verified domain
The next step is to assign your Facebook page to your verified domain. This tells Facebook that your page has permission to alter the link previews because it is associated with your domain.
- From the Domains page, click on Add Assets.
- A window will pop up where you can select the Asset Type. You should see your page listed there. In the right-hand pane, select your page as the asset.
- Click Add to associate your page with your domain. You'll now see it listed under Connected Assets.
Multiple Business Manager Accounts that need to share links from the same domain
If you have another Business Manager Account that needs to share customized links from your domain, you can assign the other Business Manager Accounts as "Partners" on your domain, following the steps below.
- Open Facebook Business Manager.
- Click on Business Settings followed by Domains.
- Choose the domain you wish to add the Partner to.
- Click on Partners followed by Assign Partner.
- From here, a pop-up will appear allowing you to enter your partner's business ID.
- Once you’ve connected your partner via their Business ID, you should be able to see their Partner name listed under Domains > Partners.
- When the partner opens their Business Manager and goes to Business Settings > Domains, they should see your verified domain listed there. Once the domain appears in their account, they can assign any pages they manage to the domain so that they can customize link previews from that website.
Q - Please explain what campaign data might be lost with the new policy and Facebook changes.
A - These are areas where the new policy will affect campaigns:
- If a person opts out of app tracking, all Facebook and Instagram campaigns mobile devices will only see “last click” events.
- Performance data will be aggregated. This will remove some of the demographic data we use to segment audiences. It will also reduce our ability to create useful custom audiences.
- Any change to one of the 8 campaign optimization events will encounter a 1-3 delay in running a campaign toward that event.
- Conversion tracking will close from a possible 28 day window to a 1 day window. 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 the data.
Q - Please explain what is meant by the 8 conversion events.
A - When a person sees an ad on Facebook, clicks and then converts on the website, Facebook will automatically attribute credit to the ad that led to that activity. This limit applies only to conversions you wish Facebook to optimize a campaign toward and track. It does not mean that only 8 things can be tracked on your website. A website can have dozens of trackable events or conversions. The limit only applies to those top 8 things you wish to track through Facebook Ads. You may still track many more events on your site for reporting and audience creation. It has no impact to Google Analytics. You do not need to change any conversion goals/events, etc. on your site.
Q - Does this change affect sponsored content or "boosted" posts in Facebook?
A - No, traffic only campaigns like boosted content will not be affected.
Q - What if my local market Facebook page is not currently under the Roche Diabetes global page structure? What process do I take?
A - The best solution is to contact Global Marketing to link your page (a local market page) to the global Facebook structure. Your market page will still have the full autonomy to post, engage, and maintain the page as usual. Being connected to the global structure allows your page to receive many benefits including:
- Global follower count
- Increased SEO within Facebook
- Page verification
- Increased channel authority
- Potentially less paid spend in boosting and ad promotion
- Increased compliance and protection
- Unified global branding
Q - Does the 8 event limit include both Facebook and Instagram?
A - Since the limit is tied to the business manager account, we believe that Facebook and Instagram share the 8 conversion event limit. Instagram ads are considered an ad placement with Facebook and not a separate platform.
Q - Should I stop spending on Facebook campaigns due to this change?
A - That is a tough question. We do not know what the full effects on campaign performance will be. It could be a disruption for the whole digital advertising industry. It could also turn out to have very little impact and things will evolve and continue. We do not know. Each affiliate should look at their marketing budget and determine what is in the best business interests of Roche and value for patients.
Taken directly from Facebook FAQ’s
Q - Why is there an 8 event limit?
A - Apple allows for a limited amount of data to be shared with platforms like Facebook when a user completes an event on a domain. Of that limited amount of information, we chose to allow for 8 events per domain given it covers the vast majority of advertiser use cases and allowed Facebook to preserve other functionality. For example, we are not enforcing additional campaign or ad set limits for web campaigns beyond the current ad limits per Page that apply to all advertisers on our platform.
Q - If an advertiser is tracking more than 8 conversion events, but does not optimize for more than 8, what is the impact for them? Also, do page views need to count as one of the 8 events?
A - Once Apple begins to enforce its iOS 14 changes, advertisers will only be able to use 8 conversion events for optimization on a single domain. While not usable for optimization, events not configured as one of the 8 conversion events for a domain can still be used for partial reporting in Ads Manager and Website Custom Audience targeting. We expect that Website Custom Audience sizes will decrease due to the loss of some conversion events from iOS 14 users. Landing Page View campaigns are not subject to the 8 event per domain limitation.
Q - Is the 8 event limitation for reporting and optimization only subject to Conversion Objectives and Value Optimization? In other words, will we be able to run brand campaigns or campaigns optimized for link clicks and not face the same limitation? If so, will we be able to get reporting on those events?
A - The 8 event limitation is for Conversion optimization and Value Optimization campaigns. Brand and Link Click campaign optimization would not be impacted, because they do not use events to optimize. However, measurement may be impacted if they are attaching an online conversion event (pixel/Conversions API) to the ad. This reporting will be governed by Aggregated Event Measurement requirements that will cause some reporting of online events to be restricted, aggregated, and delayed based on Apple's framework.