View-Through Attribution - The Missing Piece in Your Ad Strategy

While the mobile ad space is certainly still developing, mostadvertisers understand the importance of tracking clicks and installs. Savvyadvertisers use these data points to streamline and optimize their ad spend.Some of these same advertisers are also tracking impressions to understandheir click-through rates (CTRs) as well as adding a layer of accountability toad-network reporting.

Impression tracking is available through a few mobileattribution & analytics providers. Trackingimpressions is only the first step. The real insight comes with impression attributionor view-through attribution. Thereare several reasons why view-through attribution is important.

View-through attribution is the capability to credit aninstall or in-app event to a specific impression. This also enables insightinto the influence impressions have on downstream engagements.

The Problem

Attributing clicks to installs is the first step tostanding mobile ad effectiveness, but it does nothing to uncover the truthof click-through rate (CTR) or effective frequency. The only way to understand these metrics is by trackingimpressions in addition to clicks, installs, and events.

Part of what creates a healthy ecosystem is transparency.Historically, only ad networks have had any insight into impressions served. Byintroducing 3^rd-party tracking into the process, an independentsource can verify impression volume and effectiveness.

In the same way that click attribution rules can varybetween networks, impression tracking and view-through attribution include avariety of configurable aspects. Ad networks count impressions in differentways and attribute based on different criteria.

The Solution

Configurable view-through attribution puts the controlsaround defining an impression and the rules for attribution into the hands ofhe advertiser. There are several reasons why advertisers should be leveragingview-through attribution.

Gaining insight intobrand lift. As marketing budgets continue to shift toward mobile, brands need a way to measure lift outside ofinstalls and post-install events. For example, Vizio may have a companion appfor their devices, but they really want to sell hardware. By simply trackingimpressions, the Vizio team can understand the reach of their ad budget,independent of driving installs. Additionally, view-through attribution withKochava includes full influencer reporting. This insight can tie impressionswhich happened outside the configured lookback window, to an app install. Thus,Vizio can see how many times a user saw their ad impressions before installinghe companion app for their device(s), which means they made a purchase.

Understand the CTR ofa campaign. By tracking impressions as well as clicks, the advertiser canstand the relationship between how many times an ad is served to when auser clicks on the ad.

Catch users flying the radar. As hyper-personal targeting increases, a segment of usersindependently pursue a product without clicking on an ad to avoid retargetingand overwhelming ad personalization. View-through attribution allows you toattribute an impression to a user behavior without the user ever clicking onhe ad.

Understanding the comprehensive impact of your mobilecampaigns requires measuring every possible influencing aspect. View-throughattribution provides insight into every aspect of user behavior connecting thedots from ad impression all the way through post-install activity. When itcomes to your ad strategy, view-through attribution is the missing piece.

For alist of networks that support view-through attribution, check out https://www.kochava.com/new-network-integrations/.