How Gaming apps can test SKAN with Jampp

Jampp was one of the first DSPs to be approved on Apple's SKAdnetwork and start testing at scale. We began running LAT campaigns before ATT became the mandatory framework and even built our own app to start testing before advertisers were ready to launch their own SKAD campaigns. 

We are committed to providing full transparency on spend, performance, and relevant metrics to help you launch successful SKAD campaigns for your game.

In this post, we break down the campaign elements and necessary steps to launch a successful SKAD campaign with Jampp. 

1. Implementing the ATT framework for your game
2. Implementing an ATT prompt (and pre-prompts)
3. How to design the conversion value for your app
4. How to set up SKAD for success

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1) Implementing the ATT framework for your game 

Before you can launch a programmatic campaign you’ll need to support: 

• The App Tracking Transparency framework, so that users can opt in to share their IDFA for tracking purposes. With this in place, when users opt in on the publisher side and on your game, you’ll be able to continue using IDFA attribution.
• The SKAdNetwork framework, so you can track installs and also post-install conversion values when users don’t opt in.
  

PRO TIP: If you’re working with a Mobile Measurement Partner (MMP), make sure to update their latest SDK so it supports the AppTrackingTransparency framework and the SKAdNetwork framework management to simplify your workflow. Whether you are working with an MMP or direct, make sure to share your conversion value mapping with your DSP partner for tracking and optimization. 

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2) Implement a solid ATT prompt

We recommend A/B testing different messages and moments to display the pop-up. It’s important for your users to understand the value they get in exchange for sharing their data (such as playing for free).

Some marketers have also seen great results with pre-prompts. In a recent AppsFlyer report, Product Madness’ Growth Lead, Mishra Piyush, shared that they “experimented with different pre-popup layouts focusing on clarity of the message, and a friendly design to increase the opt-in rate that actually improved during the A/B testing. This was done across all the Product Madness games. The second discussion was related to the timing of the ATT prompt. We did not experiment with different languages though. (...) [they] observed that when existing users were shown a pre-prompt, opt-in rates showed a slight dip, whereas when serving the pre-prompt to new users - opt-in rates shot up.” 

PRO TIP: When testing pre-prompts, keep in mind Apple’s regulations and avoid offering incentives to encourage opt-in. We’ve gathered some best practices in this post for reference. 

3) Design your Conversion Values

With SKAD, each app needs to define one conversion value that will be received in the postback. This conversion value is an integer composed of 6 bits of information which can be combined to generate different measurement models, for example: 

• Revenue model: 2 bits are used for encoding the count of days after the install from 0 to 3, and the remaining 4 are used to track revenue.
• Simple event-based model: 3 bits used to map events (ie: 010 means "sign-up" and 011 means "purchase") while the other 3 bits are used to encode the days after the install.
• Predicted LTV-based optimization: uses 2 bits to encode the days after the install and the rest of the bits to send a predicted LTV value in incremental buckets.
  

PRO TIP: Our recommendation is to start simple. When you first launch, it's good to start tracking only installs to make sure that your SKAN implementation is working properly and start adding layers of complexity (different conversion values) later while measuring the impact on volume and data accuracy. 

4) Set up your campaign for success 

While creative insights may not be as granular as with IDFA, we know from IDFA campaigns that they play a critical role in engaging users. 

• Test every available format: Many advertisers enter SKAD tests half-heartedly, bringing a couple of creative formats to see how it works. When in reality, the creative strategy is one of the campaign elements they have the most control over. Limited formats and sizes translate to limited reach. 
• Leverage in-ad analytics: The iOS 14 privacy updates may limit user tracking post-install, but interactive ads like playables and rewarded videos offer in-ad data such as engagement rate and drop-off. This data can help you understand creative performance and what to tweak to improve user engagement.
• Iterate: Creatives should always be thought of as a process. While conversion values slow down the test cycle, it’s important to continue testing. In a scenario where targeting is tricky and tracking even more so, creatives are a campaign element marketers can’t afford to ignore. 
  

PRO TIP: It’s time to get creative 😉. Considering the limitations in data granularity for campaign performance inherent to SKAD, work with your DSPs to structure your campaigns in a way that helps you maximize learnings. Ie: split creative formats or sizes into different campaigns to get deterministic attributions for them, or split campaigns into different countries/geos. There are many opportunities to test and learn within this new scenario. 

Launch SKAD for gaming with Jampp

The SKAdNetwork scenario is still new, but those of us who have been testing and developing solutions from the beginning are starting to see results. Ally yourself with a partner that can offer support from setup to optimization.

At Jampp, we pride ourselves on being the programmatic platform ambitious companies use to grow their apps. Since Apple’s release of its new ATT framework last April, we’ve been working tirelessly along with our customers to offer support and help them scale their user acquisition efforts. We even went as far as creating our own app to test SKAdNetwork. We’ve developed proprietary technology to unlock new learnings and performance metrics. If you’re looking for a partner that can help you test and grow with SKAD, get in touch!

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