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Kochava Support for Meta’s New Install Referrer

By January 16, 2024March 20th, 2024Product Updates, News & Updates 10 Min Read

Android-specific measurement solution benefits advertisers

App install reporting on Meta Android Campaigns is improving within Kochava. Our integrations team has been working closely with Meta on the implementation of a new solution called Meta install referrer, and we are excited to announce that support is live as of January 5, 2024. We are now able to share install-level reporting on additional measurement use cases for clients who choose to leverage this solution.

What Is Meta Install Referrer?

Meta install referrer is an Android-specific measurement solution designed to help attribute ad views and clicks to the correlating app download. This means that it supports same-session click-through attribution as well as use cases unsupported by Google Play Install Referrer: most view-through attribution and cross session click-through attribution.

What Is the User Flow?

When a user views or clicks on an advertiser’s app install ad on Meta’s app (i.e., Facebook or Instagram), Meta’s app encrypts and logs the relevant ad campaign metadata in the Meta app’s local storage layer on-device.

Once the resulting install completes and the user first opens the app, the Kochava Android software development kit (SDK) reads Meta install referrer data from the local storage layer on-device and uses it for install attribution.

How Does Meta Install Referrer Help?

Advertisers will now see a more complete performance picture for their Meta Android Campaigns. It’s anticipated that the volume of unattributed installs in your reports will reduce and instead report as view-through or cross session click-through installs.

How to Use Meta Install Referrer with Kochava

Minimum Android SDK Version
To use Meta install referrer for your Android app(s), you need to be using Kochava Android SDK version 5.1.0 or higher. Please see the Meta/Facebook entry under the Additional Steps section of this support document.

Inputting Your Install Referrer Decryption Key
To enable decryption of Meta Install Referrer payloads, be sure to follow the steps outlined in this support document to input your Install Referrer Decryption Key. For Meta install referrer, there are two steps:

1. Your application development team needs to acknowledge the on-device connection between our and Meta’s client-side tech. Simply follow these steps on your next application submission to Google Play (or respective Android APK location).

Example instructions on how to input your install referrer decryption key

2. Kochava leverages the same process used for Google Play Install Referrer, which involves a decryption key. If you already entered this key to support Google Play Install Referrer per this support document, you do not need to repeat these steps.

Kochava dashboard

Please note that the Kochava attribution waterfall uses only one of the three attribution methods across Meta install referrer, Google Play Install Referrer, and self-attributing network claims—ensuring that both aggregate and user-level output do not contain duplication.

These new install-level reports are available both through Kochava install detail reports and Kochava Query within the installs_primary table.

FAQs Answered by Meta

Is there support for iOS?
No, iOS does not have an equivalent to the Meta install referrer mechanism.

When is Meta install referrer applicable for attribution?

  • Install attribution
    • Click-through attribution for all campaigns
    • View-through attribution for all Advantage+ App Campaigns and Manual App Promotion Campaigns with broad targeting (e.g., where age, gender are set to “default).
  • Google Play Store and 3rd party app stores
  • Does not include campaigns redirecting to landing pages

How does Meta define broad targeting?
Broad targeting is required to receive view-through install data. You can find the supported campaign configuration below:

  • Age: Default setting (18-65+) is applied
  • Gender: Default setting (All genders) is applied.
  • Location: Country groups, countries are all supported.
    • Note: For more targeted locations (such as cities or zip codes), if the campaign uses inclusion targeting with any of these, it would need to be set as relaxed.
  • Detailed Targeting: Interest segments, behaviors, advanced demographics are set as relaxed.
  • Custom Audiences: Set as relaxed.
    • By relaxed, we mean that the following box should be ticked in ad campaigns:

For additional questions, please connect with your Meta account representative. If you need help checking your configuration in Kochava, please contact your client success manager or email support@kochava.com.

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