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Second Install Deduplication & Methodology

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Overview

iOS 14.5 brought big changes to the mobile attribution ecosystem. One big change is that IDFA is not accessible on app install, but it can be accessed later if the user consents to Apple's AppTrackingTransparency framework. Currently, if the user installed the mobile app via a paid ad, then Branch will publish a second install event for that user that is attributed to the ad (assuming the user allowed tracking on both source and destination apps). This means that for a subset of users, there are technically two install events. In order to ensure you see accurate counts for installs, Branch has now provided functionality to "remove" the first unattributed install.

How does it work?

  1. User sees a paid ad in a publisher app (ex. Facebook/Instagram).
  2. User clicks the ad and gets routed to App Store to download the advertiser app.
  3. User installs and opens the advertiser app.
  4. An unattributed (first) install is reported in Branch's attribution system.

  1. After some time or after an event, the advertiser app prompts the user for tracking through Apple's AppTrackingTransparency framework.
  2. If the user opts into tracking in the advertiser app and the user has opted into tracking in the publisher app where they originally saw the paid ad, then Branch will report a second install.
  3. Once the deduplication is enabled, Branch will automatically "remove" the first unattributed install.
    a. The second install will take the timestamp of the first install

Implementation

Enable via Dashboard

📘

Dashboard View

Enabling via the Branch Dashboard will only affect the views/reports of that user.

  1. Log in to the Branch Dashboard and navigate to the Account Settings -> User screen.
  2. Scroll down and toggle the "Advanced calculation for organic analytics" checkbox under the Analytic Settings section.

Enable via API

You can enable the deduplication of installs if you are using the following APIs:

You can include the enable_install_recalculation boolean parameter on these APIs to de-dupe installs.

Parameter Nameenable_install_recalculation
DescriptionDe-dupe unattributed installs caused by duplicate events from non-opted-in users coming from paid ads.
Required ParameterNo
Parameter Locationbody
Default Valuefalse
Formatboolean

Please view the respective API documentation in order to properly utilize the enable_install_recalculation parameter.

Updated 8 months ago

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