The concept of privacy has always been critical in this digital era. However, Apple brought it to center stage by enforcing ATT (App Tracking Transparency) which was a groundbreaking development in the mobile advertising landscape.
For an in-depth understanding of ATT, we need to look through what it means and how it impacts the mobile advertising industry. This post will offer all the information you need to know in this regard.
What Does ATT Mean?
In April 2021, Apple announced and enforced App Tracking Transparency (ATT) to respond to increasing privacy concerns. The ATT allows users to choose if they want to permit an app to track their activity for advertising or any other purpose.
This means iPhone users (iOS 14.5 onwards) see several privacy prompts when using apps, each asking for permission to ‘track activity across other companies’ apps and websites.’ This allows users to toggle tracking on and off at any time — for individuals or several iOS apps.
The iOS user will encounter the following ATT dialog, giving them the choice to allow or disallow tracking apps.
Definition of App Tracking Transparency
ATT is Apple’s user privacy framework that supports user privacy on iPhones and iPads. All mobile apps collecting and sharing device-level data need to display a prompt that asks the user if their IDFA (Apple’s identifier for advertisers) could be collected by the app and shared.
So, Apple users can ‘opt-in’ to the prompt for sharing their IDFA or device ID with the app marketer. This is achieved through a pop-up where users confirm or deny tracking permission.
App Tracking Transparency versus Limit Ad Tracking (LAT)
On the user side, the iOS feature is referred to as Limit Ad Tracking (LAT) which lets the user opt out of having their IDFA tracked. The benefit is reduced information from advertisers on the devices.
Though LAT always existed since iOS 10, it became a default since iOS 14.5, allowing users to enable or disable IDFA tracking on an app-by-app basis.
The App Tracking Transparency (ATT) framework, as mentioned earlier, tackles this process from the app publisher and advertiser side.
Things to Remember about the ATT Prompt
- It can be displayed at any point in the experience.
- It can only offer context on how and why the data is needed and will be used.
- It can also ask the user to change their privacy settings for the app.
- It can provide a shortcut to the device’s settings menu.
- It cannot incentivize users to opt in using currency, locked content, or manipulative language.
How Does App Tracking Transparency Opt-In Work?
To gain access to the IDFA of a mobile device, an app is required to ask for permission through a prompt. If the user selects ‘Allow Tracking,’ the app will be able to access the IDFA as the default setting.
A few points to consider here –
- Historical opt-out: If the user has, in the past, disallowed personalized advertising under Apple’s LAT model, they will automatically be considered as opted-out in ATT.
- Device Settings Preventing Prompts: If the user hasn’t switched on ‘Allow Apps to Request to Track’ in their privacy settings, they will not receive the ATT prompt.
- Dual Opt-In: If the user information is to be used for advertising on any other app, there will be a dual opt-in needed – for the advertiser and the publisher.
ATT Impact on the Mobile Ad Ecosystem
ATT has had a significant impact on the mobile marketing industry. Though several mobile advertisers and developers expressed concerns about its impact on their revenue streams, privacy advocates highly appreciated ATT.
The introduction of ATT was a huge change and brought waves in the iOS mobile marketing ecosystem. Before this change, the IDFA was the basis of highly targeted mobile in-app advertising for iOS. The IDFA was key to everything from audience segmentation and attribution to fraud detection. In April 2021, 70% of iOS users had adopted version 14.5 or higher. Thus, a vast majority of the Apple mobile ecosystem had to enable this permission at the app level. The same report confirms that approximately 45% of the iOS users who upgraded to 14.5 have opted in, allowing apps to track their activity.
What Does This Mean?
- When an ad is displayed in the app, it is recorded as an impression.
- If the user has opted in for tracking, the device ID is recorded with an impression, and the app can record actions like tapping on an ad, visiting another website, or a purchase. This allows platforms to attribute the user action.
- If the user hasn’t opted in, all these events are recorded but the device ID isn’t. This breaks the association of the actions with a specific user. Thus, ATT impacts 2 major areas – audience targeting and measurement. This leads to:
- Poor visibility of the user journey
- Loss of attribution
- The analysis done through platform optimization algorithms is disrupted.
Thus, advertisers and app marketers have these next steps to follow –
- Increase Focus on Android and Opted-In iOS Inventory
For these segments, business works as before. The combined addressable marketing for these 2 is considerably high. For instance, the US alone has more than 133.4M Android users. And considering the present 35% opt-in rate, there’s still a 30M iOS user pool, building a market of more than 160 million devices.
The number goes higher in Android-first regions like India, Brazil, Indonesia, China, and others. - Prioritize Contextual Targeting for the Opted-Out Cohort
Contextual targeting is about reaching out to users based on the content they are already consuming at that time. Advertisers can leverage a plethora of contextual signals to target their audience. They are accessible on digital channels and advanced ML algorithms.
Contextual targeting also helps mobile marketers in CTV advertising (Connected TV) technology as it allows them to reach users where they are. - Track and Optimize Top-Level Metrics
Mobile marketers and advertisers have always focused on metrics like viewability, click-through rates (CTR), video completion rates (VCR), and more to measure the impact of their marketing efforts.
In the post-ATT era, these metrics are relevant and must be tracked to ensure that the ad has a wide reach and is making the necessary impact. Campaigns that focus on app installs and post-install activities need to be measured using the SKAdNetwork, Apple’s in-house, API-based privacy-compliant measurement and attribution framework.
What Happens in the Long Run?
App marketers and advertisers operating in a market dominated by iOS can choose to shift their budgets to Android – but is this a long-term solution? Definitely, not!
The iOS audience is far too valuable to ignore for long. In the long run, they need to plan a considerable amount of budget for iOS. Also:
- Marketers and advertisers must leverage technologies like SKAdNetwork coupled with mobile advertising strategies and tactics like contextual targeting and running campaigns based on metrics like CTR and VCR.
- Google will also continue prioritizing privacy-centric updates for Andriod. So, shifting budgets to Android doesn’t help.
- More laws will emerge for applying privacy rules across the board. Marketers need to prepare themselves to find the best way to reach and influence their audiences while respecting their privacy.
Where Is the Mobile Ad Industry Headed?
Here’s what’s on the horizon post-iOS 14.5+ and ATT implementation.
- Increased use of universal IDs and identity solutions in ad buying.
- Advertisers cannot rely on a single channel being universally addressable and meeting their needs.
- Ad buyers will better understand audience behavior using universal IDs.
- Advertisers investing in first-party data collection will see more success that those who don’t.
- Publisher first-party data will gain significance with audience data coming at a premium.
Ways to Increase App Tracking Transparency Opt-In Rates
ATT poses various challenges for advertisers, app marketers, and developers, one of which is reduced opt-in rates. Here are a few tactics we recommend to improve your opt-in rates in the ATT era.
Work on Your App’s User Experience
The whole idea of a user agreeing to share their data is based on trust. If yours is a well-established brand, users may not have an issue in opting in as they are familiar with your brand and app. However, this gets tricky for newer brands.
Work on building an awesome app experience and sharing valuable content. This will portray your app as a safe and trustworthy platform, encouraging them to opt in.
Leverage Pre-Prompt
Design a pre-prompt message that appears before the ATT pop-up. That way you can tailor your content to highlight how the data will be used to improve the user’s experience and the benefits of personalized advertising.
Make sure you keep your message short and to the point. Avoid interrupting the user experience. You wouldn’t want the prompt to show when a shopper is in the middle of a purchase or a player is in the middle of a game.
Here’s a graphic showing how an ideal pre-prompt show looks.
Test the pre-prompt message on a small cohort to discover what’s working and what isn’t. Test parts like the copy, tone of voice, call-to-action (CTA), and the design layout. You must also test when to show the prompt to ensure a seamless experience.
Time it Right
Determining the right time to trigger a prompt is a tricky decision. However, with some testing and experimentation, you can figure it out.
If your app needs several permissions (like push notifications, location tracking, and more), it would be wise to add the prompt during onboarding, when the flow of other permissions is on.
If that’s not the case, you can delay the prompt till the user has experienced your app and consumed some value-adding content. A news app or a food recipe app would be excellent examples of this.
You can also trigger the prompt after shooting an untargeted ad to the user.
Share Adequate Context
Users are often wary of being tracked. Researching to understand their concerns can help you determine what will get them to opt in. Apply the insights to build awareness around why tracking user data is important and how it can improve their ad experience.
This will build transparency and user trust in your app, increasing the chances of them opting in.
Leverage Deferred Deep Linking
Deep links work wonders when ensuring a great user experience because they take the user directly to the content they are looking for. Once you launch the ATT framework, a deep link will send the users to a page on your app after routing them through the App Store to install the app first. However, the application of deferred deep linking can be less for users opting out.
The Way Forward
Targeting in-app advertising is a key part of an app’s business model. However, IDFA tracking feels invasive to many users as it reveals a lot about their choices and digital persona.
Through ATT, Apple has switched the broadcast of user data by bringing in the opt-in model.
Apptrove’s features make it easy for you to get started with ATT. Here are a few key steps you need to follow –
- Set up ATT in the Apptrove SDK
- Submit your app’s privacy practice details to Apple
- Implement the ATT consent prompt
- Review the ATT settings on our dashboard
If you need more assistance implementing ATT on your app, get in touch with our expert or book a demo. Our team can answer your burning questions and offer fitting solutions for your mobile marketing needs.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why does ATT matter?
ATT prevents apps from procuring user data without their consent. Thus, user data goes only where they want it to.
Take Meta, for instance. The social media giant collects volumes of data across Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp and provides it to advertisers. Now that ATT is on, Meta can no longer leverage data collected on untracked iOS devices, making it tough for advertisers to target and personalize their campaigns on ad networks.
Is ATT applicable to Android?
ATT is a feature by Apple iOS and hence it does not apply to Android. It does prevent advertisers from using third-party data collected through Android.
Google has brought in a similar web privacy approach to Android but it’s less restrictive than ATT. That’s because it isn’t easy to balance the desire to safeguard user privacy and cater to its advertising revenue interests.
Are there any specific requirements for App Store listings?
Apple has set clear guidelines to ensure that all developers and marketers use the same language in their App Tracking Transparency. They have spelled out what’s included in each kind of data usage to help with Analytics, Product Personalization, and Third-Party Advertising.
To be eligible for placement in the App Store, the app developer must disclose their app’s privacy practices, including any third-party code like SDKs in the app.
