Facebook Mobile Ad App Installs not showing up in campaign reports

Question

I have successfully implemented the Facebook SDK and AppEvents to report installation of my Android app. I have verified that it registers the last install data in the dashboard, and I see thousands of fb_mobile_activate_app events in my App Events tab on Facebook.

I have been running a paid campaign on the app, however, even after over 24 hours since adding the SDK, I am getting reports of 0 installs. Since I am basing my budget on how the ads perform, it seems odd to not have any data.

Is there something I am missing here?

Bayonet

It has now been about 5 days with no data. The Facebook support team gave me a terrible canned answer, and I am now waiting to hear back from the team. They have lost a customer, and I have stopped spending the hundreds a day on ads I had been due to this issue. Very disappointing. – Bayonet

How are you reporting the activates from your app? – Tourney

I use the Facebook SDK and the activate call, which generates App Events. I am able to verify I am receiving these events (at this point, well into 6 digits), and I also can verify on my app dashboard that it is recording installs. I see last install as 30 seconds ago. To be clear, I do NOT use Facebook login or anything, so my Facebook app is not submitted--but the docs say this is explicitly not required. – Bayonet

To be specific: com.facebook.AppEventsLogger.activateApp(this, "<redacted app id>"); in my onResume of my activities. Although, I know this is working since the App Events show up on my account on the web. What is missing is my App Installs from ads just show 0. With thousands of clicks for a free game, I would be surprised if the true number is really 0. If it is, that is certainly interesting too ;) – Bayonet

Couple of more questions. 1. You created a mobile app install ad (developers.facebook.com/docs/ads-for-apps/mobile-app-ads), correct? 2. Did you create any tracking specs? – Tourney

Yep on the mobile install ad (for Android). Not familiar with a tracking spec. – Bayonet

developers.facebook.com/docs/reference/ads-api/tracking-specs If you've setup a tracking spec with your ad, then you'll need to add the mobile app install ones to it. If you haven't set one up, then it should use the default ones. – Tourney

Just looked more and no, I haven't set one up. Didn't seem from the documentation that I need to. Any ideas? – Bayonet

Hi, Can you send me your app-id and campaign-id ? I work at Facebook and would be happy to check what's happening here. Also, did you file a bug via our bugs tool ? Is that where you got a canned response ? If so, can you link to that bug as well ? Please send me a confidential reply. – Mahalia

I just realized you cannot send messages via Stackoverflow. I recommend that you file a bug on our Bug tool, mark it confidential and provide the app-id and campaign-id details. – Mahalia

Deepak--frankly I have submitted the issue 2 different places already, and blindly submitting to a bug tool doesn't seem like a good use of time. Would you be able to contact me via email? The address is my first name @realcasualgames.com. Thanks, I really appreciate your help! – Bayonet

Hi, I would really prefer a bug with the details requested. If there's a deficiency in the process, it's in our best interest to try and fix that. Also, your email isn't decipherable based on your comment, I don't know what your first name is. It would be a great help if you pointed out the 2 places where you submitted the bug (not including stack overflow). My team is directly responsible for triaging and responding to developer issues filed via the bug tool, so the last thing I would expect there is an unsatisfactory canned response. – Mahalia

Hey, is your name Derek ? Based on your company's name, I was able to pull up the support case you submitted last week. My apologies for the delay on this. It seems like the campaign you created was using our One-link flow, where you plugged in the Google Play URL directly into the create flow and proceeded to setup the campaign. But in reality, this kind of campaign is only able to measure clicks and not installs. That's why your campaign report wasn't showing any installs. To confirm, your campaign-id ends in 2824, right ? – Mahalia

Thanks for digging in! Yes, that is correct. Is there anything I can do to change that now? Is retro active data possible? – Bayonet

Also, can the documentation be updated? It seems odd a Mobile App Install ad, with a goal of App Installs wouldn't report back install data :-/ Thanks again for the help. – Bayonet

Unfortunately, we can't backfill data for these kind of campaigns. The best recourse would be to pause those campaigns and setup campaigns that track installs. We do document the different method of setting up ads and running campaigns but appear to be subtly mentioning that the one-link flow campaigns can help measure clicks and CTR - developers.facebook.com/docs/ads-for-apps/mobile-app-ads/…. We will try to make the distinction more obvious. – Mahalia

I'm still not clear. I followed that tutorial you sent which is what I have now. What type of campaign am I looking for? – Bayonet

To be clear, I went through all the steps including registering my app, integrating the SDK and validating AppEvents, including the install/activate is being passed through to my dashboard. What am I missing? – Bayonet

I got this working. It turns out even though I had the Facebook app, it wouldn't let me select it while creating the ad, so I pasted my URL instead. I recreated the campaign by using the same flow, but selecting the Facebook app and it now works. – Bayonet

Answer 1

Be sure you have your goal point to a Facebook app, and never have to paste in your Google Play URL.

Bayonet

In plain English - when opening an App Installs campaign you need to choose your app from the drop down loist. Never paste your Google Play URL. – Irrepealable

@Irrepealable Is that still true? – Recital

Integrated App event sdk and do we require any other sdk to add in android app – Evergreen

@AjayPrajapati I have integrated Android sdk but I am not able to see the app installs for my app. I am doing it for a year but ads manager never shows the data. My app is built with Flutter. Any help would be appreciated. – Byre

Answer 2

If your mobile app campaigns previously used a Google Play or iTunes link, you'll need to recreate your campaigns to utilize the install tracking via the Facebook Mobile SDKs.

Monti