With the iOS 14 update release, users can make up their minds whether professionals will track their activity through a privacy prompt. The activity-tracking limitation will further impact ad campaign targeting and optimisation. But, the limitation will affect social media giants like Facebook. Such advertising giants rely on user activity to offer marketers great results.

As a result, the marketing experts may observe a 60% decrease in conversions. Since the launch of the transparency feature, the suspicion grew around the update. Since the transparency feature was rolled out, a small percentage of mobile users based in the US have allowed tracking.

So, as you scroll ahead, you can check out how the iOS update will impact social media marketing. Think about approaching a social media agency in London if you plan to promote your services or products online. 

How is the iOS 14 update affecting social media marketing?

Social media marketing was affected considerably as the iOS 14 update was announced. Marketing teams will perceive the impact along with the Facebook marketing agencies working inside the company. It’s clear that it has also had a profound impact on the reach of small businesses, and the strategies that marketing professionals use to target those audiences that were, prior to the update, easy to find and highly converting. 

As the app is primarily used on mobile phones, the iOS 14 update will impact the worth of targeted advertising to a great extent.

According to Flurry Analytics, the opt-in rates for every day will be anything between 4-6% for US mobile app users. The observation will be much different from the earlier estimates, up to 40%. Moving ahead, Facebook will offer personalised advertising to mobile app users. Markets sense this as an imminent threat to marketing on social media apps like Facebook, Twitter, and Snapchat. So, let’s check out the update’s impact on social media marketing.  

Decreases the amount of data on iOS 14 users

With the new update, Apple will use identifiers for advertisers (IDFA) to tag users and keep track of anonymity. The user can opt-out or allow Apple to share the identifiers based on every app through the transparency feature. 

In such a scenario, all the app developers must ask for users’ permission or get kicked out of the App Store. As more users find a convenient way to move out, there will be a decrease in the amount of data that a digital marketing agency can gather. 

This will mean that marketers must explore other ways of targeting and reaching Cold audiences, such as those at the top of the funnel that were previously targeted through the likes of demographics and interests.

Impacts conversion campaigns

Conversion campaigns are likely to be impacted by customers opting out of having their activity tracked, as it will impact the ease of monitoring which customers directly convert as a result of seeing and clicking on the Facebook ads. 

This is where it’s important to consider how conversions are ranked within the conversion settings, and making sure that the top priority for Facebook conversion campaigns is Conversion. The change has also impacted the number of events that the Pixel can track, which is another reason to monitor and amend how the conversion actions are prioritised in this setting. 

Apart from tracking the conversion action, it will help ensure the action is ranked first. If the rank of the event is anything between the second rank and the last rank, then social media platforms may not be able to follow the event.

Sets limits on ad targeting and optimisation

While Facebook can optimise the ads, it will be limited as it relies on conversions data. Considering the impact of limited conversion tracking, the realm of the retargeting pool will decrease ahead. But, you may not observe a significant impact owing to the Aggregated Event Measurement protocol. 

The digital marketing team will consistently assess and optimise the targeted audience. In that case, you don’t have to waste valuable resources and money on overlapping audiences. If you wish to enhance your brand’s online credibility, it’s always beneficial to work alongside a social media agency in London for genuine and long-lasting strategies.

Changes the data for reporting

The 28 day click attribution window is a thing of ancient history. Since the iOS update, the default attribution window limits the reporting window to just 7 days. This, naturally, means that the time period where user activity and data can be gathered has been considerably limited.

Professionals will have to change the social media marketing strategy for Facebook. They first have to verify the domain due to the Aggregated Event Measurement protocol. They also have to rank the event to succeed in tracking the users and those who have purchased the services or products. A bit later, there will be a need to look back at the ad history and compare the results of 28 days with 7 days. As the professionals go through the ad history, they can check the true decrease in conversions.

Bottom Line

A broadly targeted ad can help achieve the business goals more effectively than a great ad. If you wish to run online marketing campaigns for your company, and tackle the impact of the iOS update, a social media agency in London will be able to provide a cohesive and proactive strategy that counteracts the decrease in performance that many small businesses have seen. 

Because it’s not necessarily a lack of performance, but a need for a smarter way of marketing, that industry professionals working in social media marketing, can alight on.