How the leading MMPs support your SKAdNetwork campaigns

The role of measurement platforms in SKAdNetwork

Mobile Measurement Partners (MMPs) are impartial referees that measure attribution. They allow advertisers to measure campaign performance across ad networks and DSPs, providing a comprehensive view of their different marketing campaigns, channels, and media sources. In the world of SKAdNetwork, MMPs also help marketers map and test conversion values. 

Working in tandem with a DSP like Jampp and the right MMP is not only the best way for marketers to get started with SKAN, but also to test and iterate new strategies to boost their mobile iOS campaigns. 

That is why we’ve put together an overview of our customers’ preferred MMPs and how they are supporting marketers looking to grow on iOS—we hope you find the best fit for you! 😉

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Switching to SKAdNetwork 4.0: the good and the not-so-good

The 4.0 version of SKAN was first announced in June 2022 together with a set of exciting updates. When asked about the SKAN changes they were most excited about, MMPs agreed on three major changes:

• Longer conversion windows with up to three postbacks, providing further visibility into how much a user engages with an app after clicking on an ad.
• The introduction of coarse-grained conversion values, which allows advertisers to get some indication of campaign quality even when the campaign does not generate enough conversions to get a fine-grained value.
• Lock Window, a new parameter that allows marketers to receive their postbacks before the end of a conversion window. 

But there’s still a lot of room for improvement in SKAN 4.0. Some of the drawbacks brought up by the leading MMPs include the new level of complexity all these updates bring to an already complex framework; the long delay for receiving a postback, especially for the second and third postbacks (24-144 hours); and the inability to identify or connect the second and third postbacks to the first.

Here’s how different MMPs are adapting to these updates 👇

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The leading MMPs break down their SKAdNetwork features

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Adjust continues to develop solutions that allow advertisers to make data-driven decisions in the post-IDFA era. Their SKAN 4.0-ready iOS solutions are supported by main three pillars: 

• Full AppTrackingTransparency (ATT) support, allowing marketers to convert users to consented users by maximizing opt-ins and leveraging ATT data. 
• Seamless SKAN reporting is an integral part of Adjust’s comprehensive SKadNetwork solution. Marketers can easily make decisions by glancing at the dynamic dashboards as well as drilling down into granular SKAN insights. 
• Limitless conditions for your conversion values is a unique offering by which Adjust’s Advanced Setup allows clients to efficiently map their conversion values with separate time intervals for each and no limit to the funnel conditions.

Mapping conversion values with Adjust

Conversion Hub is Adjust's one-stop shop for conversion value mappings. Leveraging machine learning to examine app data and information about different app categories, this tool suggests the most effective conversion value setup for an app based on marketers’ unique goals and events.  Alternatively, should marketers have their own complex conversion value setups in mind, Adjust will also allow them to map these.

“Now is the time for marketers to start thinking about how they’re going to assign coarse values and lockWindows, which Conversion Hub is being updated to support. This means Adjust will offer conversion value mapping for both fine and coarse grain values. We’re excited to work with our partners and clients to fully explore this potential.”  —Sandra Johansson, Product Manager Next Generation Measurement at Adjust.

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AppsFlyer is currently focused on supporting app marketers in three different ways:

1️⃣ SKAN Configuration Conversion Studio: a flexible SKAN conversion value management tool that lets advertisers map conversion values with no limitations and in no time. With Conversion Studio advertisers can: split metrics, measure revenue, measure funnels, fine-tune their conversion value strategy, prioritize measurement, and get revenue range recommendations

2️⃣ Single Source of Truth (SSOT): AppsFlyer’s SSOT combines data from multiple attribution sources to provide advertisers with a clear picture of campaign performance without compromising user privacy.

3️⃣ Data modeling: Overcoming data blindspots that ATT and SKAN created using null conversion value modeling and LTV modeling of day 7 accumulated revenue that includes AppsFlyer reported revenue + SKAN modeled revenue.

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Mapping conversion values with AppsFlyer

AppsFlyer’s Conversion Studio is a flexible tool that makes it easy to map conversion values with an intuitive visual interface. Instead of assigning bit allocation manually, advertisers can choose the different in-app event occurrences, revenue ranges, and plug their measurement goals directly into Conversion Studio.

"When it comes to SKAN and iOS, our customers rely on us to help them tackle all of their challenges. The combination of an intuitive, flexible tool for mapping conversion values and advanced modeling solutions helps marketers overcome the data blindspots that ATT and SKAN created. Our goal is to ensure our customers can maximize their marketing ROI in the privacy-centric landscape." —Roi Tamir, Product Manager at AppsFlyer.

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SKAN brings additional complexity to mobile measurement, Branch’s approach is to minimize complexity while enabling maximum customer flexibility. To that end, Branch’s efforts are aimed at:

1️⃣Enabling marketers to stay effective: Branch’s SDK and dashboard configuration tools are designed to help app marketers get started and stay flexible by easily mapping SKAN conversion values. Their latest SDK fully supports SKAN 4.0 changes, allowing advertisers to easily lock or anchor conversion values to choose the most effective measurement strategy for their business. 

2️⃣Providing effective reporting: Branch’s goal is to continue to provide the measurement needed for marketers to stay effective with privacy-centric reporting. SKAN Unified View allows advertisers to monitor all their SKAN data in a centralized dashboard including newly added data granularity available in SKAN 4.0.

3️⃣Seamlessly integrating with partners: Branch’s integrations with the leading ad networks and DSPs allow advertisers to relay their campaign success metrics to their ad partners to ensure continual refining of their iOS efforts.

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Measuring campaign success by mapping conversion values in the Branch dashboard

One of the most difficult aspects of SKAN is relaying and measuring campaign success to ad partners early and effectively. Branch’s dashboard allows marketers to dynamically assign conversion values to specific in-app events. This mapping is later used to report on campaign earnings through unified, deduped SKAN reporting. Not only does this enable marketers to get closer to the golden metric of ROAS, but it also abstracts the complexity of decoding conversion events against the campaign. It allows the marketer to stay dynamic and effective amidst the difficulty of SKAN measurement.

“Our customers look to Branch to ensure compliance with Apple’s policies. We’ve made it our goal to make it easy for marketers to maintain marketing efficacy while reducing the risk of getting bumped from the App Store amidst the ever-changing Apple policies.” —Adam Landis, Head of Growth, Branch.

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Kochava understands that SKAdNetwork can be challenging for advertisers, so their mission is to make it simple, approachable, and actionable. Their team helps guide marketers through the best SKAdNetwork configuration for their app based on a variety of factors, including their industry/vertical, the in-app events they’re measuring, their campaign goals & key performance indicators, and more. 

Kochava FoundryTM, their in-house team of data scientists and experts, developed a script-based, data-driven analysis that can be run against any iOS app. This proprietary technology takes into account an app’s historical data and identifies the ideal SKAdNetwork configuration & conversion model settings to boost performance.

“Remember that you’re not stuck with your first implementation approach to SKAdNetwork. If it doesn’t work well for you or give you the data you need—it can be reconfigured without the need for a full app update. We can help you test and learn to find the optimal configuration approach that works for your business and gives you the insights you need for success.” —Grant Simmons, VP Foundry at Kochava.

Mapping conversion values with Kochava

Kochava has a variety of SKAdNetwork conversion models that enable marketers to visualize SKAdNetwork performance through the lens that aligns with their business objectives. This bends the conversion values to the needs of the marketer, as opposed to the other way around. As SKAN 4.0 rolls out, Kochava’s goal is to automatically map existing fine-grained conversion value definitions into intuitive coarse-grained equivalents for the majority of their models—making the transition as seamless as possible.

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Marketers need data faster and reporting gaps to be filled in to make informed decisions, which is why Singular has worked tirelessly to be the only MMP to provide modeled and cohorted SKAN metrics (such as ROI/ROAS) and combined SKAN cost & conversions. Their SKAN Advanced Analytics was designed to offer the easiest experience for a marketer working in or starting with SKAN, providing SKAN ETL with 3 different default schemas for all postbacks, raw data, and enhanced data. As a result, they’ve seen their clients achieve 3-10x in ROI, which encouraged these advertisers to increase their spend on iOS again.

“Our platform also provides SKAN estimated install dates, model recommendations, null conversion values, and near-real-time D7 revenue. These data points combine to secure enough transparency to understand source data and compare and make decisions accordingly. This has been so essential to our advertisers moving their spend back to iOS, that we ensure that it is included at no extra cost for the entire Singular client base.” —Susan Kuo, COO & Co-Founder of Singular.

Singular also strives to be consultative with its clients and to share best practices and industry updates on an ongoing basis.

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Testing conversion models with Singular

Singular offers SKAN Smart Conversion Management which includes 7 conversion models to choose from and Optimized Conversion Models which optimizes the accuracy of the existing conversion model.

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Moving forward: next steps for boosting your SKAdNetwork campaign

When we asked the leading MMPs to predict the next trend in mobile marketing, they agreed that privacy-focused initiatives will continue to be highly relevant in 2023, as we should expect to see updates regarding Android’s Privacy Sandbox as well as potential new SKAN versions. 

Each of these updates will bring new challenges, so we recommend app marketers to stay informed and keep their strategy relevant. If you haven’t tested SKAdNetwork yet, now’s the perfect time to do it. If you’re already running SKAN, work together with your MMP and DSP partners to optimize your results and keep driving success for your app.  

To read more about SKAdNetwork, check out our blog or contact us to learn how Jampp can help you scale your iOS campaigns.

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