As the adoption of Apple’s SKAdNetwork (SKAN) 4.0 begins to accelerate, there are many new features in this latest version that provide a privacy-preserving way for advertisers to track the effectiveness of their ad campaigns on iOS devices. Postbacks are the key output of Apple’s attribution framework, allowing advertisers to receive insights about how effective their ad campaigns are at driving app installs and other conversion events while protecting user privacy.
Let’s take a look at what a postback is and how these nuggets of campaign performance data change in SKAN 4.0.
A postback is a standard set of fields and associated values that gives insight into the conditions surrounding an app install and other key milestones in the customer journey that were influenced by paid performance media.
At the most basic level, when a SKAN-compliant ad impacts an iOS user’s decision to install an app, postbacks are notifications sent to media partners like InMobi (as well as to advertisers directly in some cases) once SKAN finishes monitoring for additional post-install activities and a randomized delay expires.
Each postback includes anonymized insights about which campaign inspired a user to convert and what actions they took, with the level of detail varying based on how well a user’s privacy is protected, how influential an ad is determined to be by Apple, and which version of SKAN applies.
Here is the laundry list of all fields that can be included in a postback:
The fields I just listed fall into one of four categories:
Record Parameters
These are identifiers that de-duplicate records, enable integrations, and validate the authenticity of a postback:
Campaign Parameters
Parameters specify the app being advertised and the specific campaign
associated with the conversion event:
Media Parameters
These are specifics about the media partner, ad inventory, and circumstances that
triggered the conversion event:
User Journey Parameters
These include privacy-safe details on how and when a user interacted with an ad and their conversion behavior:
Each new version of SKAN has come packaged with new or modified fields that can be received. Before SKAN 3.0, only the winning ad could receive a postback from Apple. But now an advertiser can get their own copy of winning postbacks directly and up to five additional ads can be rewarded for assisting with a conversion by receiving their own less detailed postback. Here’s who is eligible to receive a postback:
In SKAN 4, there are a few key changes with postbacks to be aware of:
The winning ad network is now eligible to receive up to three postbacks instead of one, and these postbacks are associated with fixed conversion windows. The sequence that a particular postback applies to will be indicated by a value of one, two, or three in the new “Postback Sequence Index” parameter.
Campaign ID is now renamed Source ID, which can be up to four digits instead of two. The additional two digits can only be received with the first postback and only when certain privacy conditions are met
The first postback can now include a less granular conversion value with less strict privacy requirements called the Coarse Conversion Value. This new value is also what’s included anytime a conversion qualifies to receive the new second or third postback.
Since SKAN 4.0 now supports Safari mobile web-to-app conversions, a new parameter called Source Domain is now available in instances where a web ad click leads to a conversion, as long as certain privacy conditions are met.
We have a lot more information that can help you navigate your way around new updates to SKAN 4.0. For starters, check out our complete SKAN Resource Center and our SKAN 4.0 Readiness Checklist.
If you need a more intro-level on SKAN 4.0, please download The Essential SKAN 4.0 Playbook.
And please reach out to our team of SKAN experts at performance@inmobi.com. We’d love to hear from you – and remember, no question is too basic when it comes to learning how to adopt Apple’s SKAN 4.0!
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