Recommendations for setting up campaigns for mobile apps

Merging campaigns and groups

Don't split campaigns by categories or queries. Instead, use ad groups within a single campaign.

Try merging targeting regions within a single campaign. If necessary, allocate them to separate groups in the same campaign.

Same audience in different campaigns

Launching multiple parallel campaigns targeting the same audience makes strategy training more difficult. Splitting statistics between them results in a lack of conversions for training.

Notes on how ads for mobile apps compete for impressions

Ads for a mobile app and ads for a site placed by the same advertiser compete with each other for impressions on mobile devices, but don't affect the bid. Each auction is individual: the system selects the ad with the highest conversion probability. To learn more, see How the Yandex Direct auction works.

The system shows the optimal SERP variation and takes into account many other aspects, for example, in which SERP layout the ad will appear.

Strategy training: targets and budget

If you can't choose a strategy and calculate the CPA, launch the Maximum clicks strategy. After getting the statistics, you can switch to the Maximum conversions strategy with pay per click. After the strategy is trained and accumulates enough conversions, you can re-optimize the campaign for a deeper goal down the funnel.

Specify a competitive average cost per install (CPI) or average cost per action or in-app action (CPA). Besides KPIs, also consider system recommendations and the budget forecast.

Make sure your budget is enough for successful strategy training:

• The minimum recommended weekly campaign budget = 70 × CPI/CPA.
• The optimal recommended weekly campaign budget = 350 × CPI/CPA.

If the campaign gets less than 70 conversions per week, choose a goal where conversions are moire frequent to train the strategy. If you are using a goal up the funnel, consider the correlation between the intermediate and final goals. To get more data, merge multiple campaigns into one.

Don't change the strategy settings while it is training (this takes about 14 days). After the training is complete, make adjustments no more than once every two–three days and by no more than 20%. These recommendations apply both to budget changes and CPI or CPA adjustments.

Relaunching training

By relaunching training, you may reduce the number of clicks or conversions you get for a few days, because the system needs some time to adapt to the new settings.

Recommendations on setting up campaigns for iOS apps

iOS 14.5 or higher contains changes that affect ads for mobile apps in Yandex Direct.

SKAdNetwork tracks conversions and allows advertisers to collect data on the performance of ad campaigns while ensuring user privacy. A user permission is required to access the ad ID and track conversions. Apple SKAdNetwork works across all sites: Yandex Search, Yandex Advertising Network on sites, and in-app Yandex Advertising Network.

Setup and launch

Set up tracking links

Apps must support the Apple SKAdNetwork API to effectively handle iOS traffic.

To track installs and ads, use mobile measurement platforms (MMPs). We recommend disabling the “AppsFlyer Advanced Privacy” option when using AppsFlyer.

Enable the following options

• In a unified performance campaign, enable Use SKAdNetwork.
• In the Campaign Wizard, under Strategy, enable Campaign for iOS 14.5 and higher.

This enables Yandex Direct to get data on installs from SKAdNetwork. Enabling options for conversion transfer doesn't segregate impressions by operating system version.

Available strategies

The following strategies are available in iOS campaigns:

• Maximum conversions without pay per install.
• Maximum clicks.
• Maximum clicks with manual bids in search results.

To train the strategy, campaigns with SKAdNetwork use conversions from users who agreed to have their data collected and transmitted to the advertising system.

It is better to start placement for acquiring new users with one campaign for all sites (Yandex Search and Yandex Advertising Network), because in the beginning there may not be enough conversions to train the strategy. If on the third week of placement the Yandex Direct statistics shows that the ads bring more than 70 installs per week for each placement, you can create separate campaigns for them: one for Yandex Search and one for the Yandex Advertising Network.

Statistics

Campaign statistics will be available in the Report Wizard. It will include the goals:

• App installs: Installations counted by the Mobile Measurement Platform. Available for all data cross-sections.
• App installs (SKAdNetwork): Installs counted by SKAdNetwork. They are available only with a breakdown by campaign — cross sections by user characteristics are unavailable. Yandex Direct gets aggregated data within 48 hours.

For app publishers

If you are a publisher of apps that host ads, read the SKAdNetwork support section in the Yandex Mobile Ads SDK.

Questions?