Facebook Ads Manager is essential for advertisers. Yet, data accuracy is often questioned. Popsixle is here to build your confidence in your Facebook attribution by quantifying your accuracy and providing account settings to improve it.
Part 1: Assessing Facebook Reporting Accuracy
Popsixle helps assess the accuracy of your Facebook Ads reporting by:- Analyzing your Facebook data when you start using Popsixle.
- Offering recommendations for optimizing Popsixle settings to fix underlying issues affecting reporting accuracy.
Once these optimizations are implemented, the Facebook Attribution Accuracy report on the Popsixle Customer Dashboard helps you visually monitor and quantify the improvement in data accuracy over time.
For a refresher on how to navigate Popsixle Customer Dashboard, watch the 4 minute video tour
Part 2: Reading your Attribution Accuracy Report
The attribution accuracy report is displayed as a graph measuring actual Facebook attributed purchases against the expected range of attribution to find if reporting is accurate. The graph will show up to 30 days of attribution data starting from when Popsixle was first turned on.
Below are two snapshots: one showing 30 days of attribution data for a subscribed Popsixle customer, and 9 days of attribution data for a newly launched free trial.
Here's a breakdown of the four different lines to help you to know if data is accurate:
- FB 7-day click attributed purchases (bolded blue line): shows the percentage of 7-day click attribution purchases that Facebook claims credit for. These values are synced daily from your Facebook Ads Manager account and represent the actual purchases Facebook attributed.
- You'll also see a blue dotted line representing total attributed purchases combining 7-day click and 1-day view attribution. This is added for general reference and is not counted toward accuracy. Facebook will take credit for both, but as part of Popsixle's methodology we believe it's best to distinguish between a customer who clicked a Facebook ad to buy a product vs. a customer who saw the ad and never clicked but bought the product later from the store's site
- Expected Attribution Range (pink shading): This shows the percentage of site traffic and purchases tracked by Popsixle associated with Facebook click IDs (FBC). This represents the percentage of total purchases that we expect Facebook to take credit for. The pink dotted line represents the more specific amount that Popsixle expects attribution to be within that range.
You can know how accurate the data is by noting where the bolded blue line of attributed purchases is in reference to pink-shaded Expected Range:
- If the bolded blue line of attributed purchases is inside of the pink-shaded Expected Range, that indicates accurate and trustworthy reporting.
- If the bolded blue line of attributed purchases rises over the pink-shaded Expected Range, that indicates over-attribution by Facebook.
- Falling under the pink-shaded Expected Range indicates under-attribution
Part 3: Making Improvements
How Popsixle improves Reporting Accuracy:
In addition to providing the tool to measure accurate reporting, Popsixle helps you to improve it. Here are two upgrades made to our base code in spring 2023 to optimize reporting accuracy:
Popsixle's PRO Code - the PRO (Purchase Routing Optimization) code intelligently routes non-standard purchase events from your Shopify store to different event types so they are not also counted as web purchase events Nonstandard events include recurring subscriptions, offline/draft orders, and Facebook/Instagram Shop (Advantage+ ad campaigns). You can read more about the PRO code here.
External ID - this code enables external ID parameters with every data payload. External IDs give Facebook a better understanding of each user on your site, improving deduplication, accuracy, and reporting.
What you can do to improve Reporting Accuracy:
If you're dissatisfied with your reporting accuracy, here are Popsixle's recommendations to improve it:
- Eliminate Multiple Data Sources - over-attribution is often a result of multiple data sources sending data back to Facebook without proper deduplication. Here's what Popsixle recommends:
- Turn off the Shopify CAPI (Conversion API) data connection by setting it to "Conservative" in your Shopify Facebook store settings. This ensures that Popsixle is your only server-side connection, improving reporting accuracy. Follow the steps in this guide to turn it off.
- Deactivate other server-side connections such as Elevar, Trackify, Hyros, Wicked Reports, etc., so that Popsixle remains your only server-side connection.
- Turn off the Shopify CAPI (Conversion API) data connection by setting it to "Conservative" in your Shopify Facebook store settings. This ensures that Popsixle is your only server-side connection, improving reporting accuracy. Follow the steps in this guide to turn it off.
- Make sure landing pages are accounted for - Reach out to let our team know if your site is driving traffic to any other domains, such as a separate landing page (brand.com vs. signup.brand.com)
Part 4: Work with the Popsixle Team
For personalized recommendations and assistance, it’s advisable to contact the Popsixle team at success@popsixle.com or via the chat widget. The team can work with you to improve your reporting accuracy and assess your individual needs.
Conclusion
Achieving accurate Facebook Ads reporting is crucial for making informed advertising decisions. With Popsixle's tools and recommendations, you can optimize your reporting, build trust in your Facebook Ads Manager data, and make more confident and timely decisions. If your reporting accuracy is high, it’s an indication of reliable data which can be used for effective advertising strategies.