- In Southeast Asia, the Report finds that view-through attribution (VTA) drives significant installs in certain markets and verticals.
- eCommerce, Media & Entertainment, and Finance see higher (VTA) adoption, and the VTA conversions can go up to as high as 90.8% for the travel industry.
- Incorporating VTA with click-through attribution (CTA) helps capture true consumer journey and drives downstream benefits, such as 113% faster ad optimization and more stable auction spend.
- Videos are more engaging than generic creatives, hence marketers should look beyond immediate click behaviour to accurately measure brand engagement.
AppsFlyer, the global attribution leader, today released its inaugural View-Through Attribution (VTA) Report. From Q4 2020 until February 2021, the report looked at impressions, examined video content, and VTA campaigns performance across 6 SEA countries (Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, and the Philippines) and 9 Industries (Shopping, Travel, Gaming, Finance, Entertainment, Education, Food & Drink, Lifestyle, and Health & Fitness) with the objective to provide marketers with insights into how right attributions could capture true consumer journey, increase optimization and drive benefits.
The report found that ads and videos are so immersive and engaging that users do not necessarily interact with the ad immediately because they do not want to leave the video experience midway. These users said they expect to engage with brands in a meaningful way as they claimed to be 1.5X more likely to purchase an item. Video exposure is impactful and influences purchase behavior. Incorporating VTA can help allocate credit in line with true consumer behavior.
In a study by Nielsen and Teluna, commissioned by TikTok For Business, consumers on video platforms said they will continue browsing content before moving to external websites or apps, with YouTube users supporting 60% of this statement, 58% on TikTok, 45% on Instagram and 40% on Facebook. This means that marketers should look beyond immediate click behaviour to accurately measure brand engagement.
VTA is an important metric to accurately measure the true user journey, since many users will purchase an item or install an app at a later stage. The report found that all SEA markets have at least VTA windows of 24 to 48 hours with up to 83.8% conversion rate.
“Constantly looking to expand our horizons, we are pleased to announce the all-new inaugural view-through attribution report. Southeast Asia’s flourishing video content landscape is providing advertisers with novel ways to tap into new opportunities when engaging customers in a rapidly evolving ecosystem. We encourage marketers to use the report to utilise key data and insights on how best to maximise their campaign performances and understand the interconnections between determining metrics, behaviours and trends across Southeast Asian mobile app users,” states Ronen Mense, President and Managing Director for APAC, AppsFlyer.
Video ad inventories have become a growing mechanism in Southeast Asia, especially amid Southeast Asia’s flight to digital, accounting for 40% of all programmatic ad spends in the region. From this, short video ads of approximately 10 seconds drive installs or post-install events on platforms such as TikTok, making it a popular choice for advertisers to utilise in their campaigns. The rise of video has turned marketers towards using VTA models to best attribute their marketing efforts, compared to when using non-video inventories. The VTA Report also emphasised that marketers still need to incorporate a call to action to encourage conversion – as Impression-to-Install still remains somewhat low.
The report also found that due to the longer consideration process for “high-involvement” verticals, higher VTA is seen. Amongst all verticals examined, Finance in particular showed that despite fewer video impressions, more conversions were accredited to view-through attribution. High VTA rates were also seen in other verticals such as eCommerce and Media & Entertainment, with the lowest VTA rate seen in Gaming – averaging out at slightly less than a day across all countries. Marketers should therefore consider re-calibrating their attribution models according to their vertical and incorporate VTA as an important metric for conversions, as many users may not convert upon their first view.
Additional highlights from the report:
– Key festivities such as Singles’ Day and New Year and lockdowns play an important role in peaks in clicks in the Food and Drink vertical, driven by VTA in Singapore and Indonesia.
— Health & Fitness apps in particular saw a spike in Southeast Asian markets in October, especially Indonesia, Thailand and Vietnam, mainly as a result of cross-regional awareness campaigns. A similar outcome was seen in December during the transition to the new year with health and fitness, and shopping apps.
– Marketers that are able to measure and optimize a CTA and VTA method have seen success in their campaigns.
— In Southeast Asia, ecommerce, media & entertainment, and finance are the verticals with the highest CTA + VTA and are able to optimize ads by 113% faster with low spend.
— TikTok data shows industries such as Finance, E-commerce and Media and Entertainment recorded at least 22.8% VTA conversions when compared with CTA conversions across Southeast Asia in 2020 and VTA conversions can go up to 90.8%.
– The importance of the VTA model: if the average attribution window for one vertical is one day, an Install registered by a viewer would be accredited as most users in Southeast Asia need access to WiFi to download an app.
– Singapore, being a more developed market, has a longer average attribution window of close to 1.5 days unlike just over a day in Philippines and Thailand as consumers in established economies take a longer time to convert.
– iOS 14.5’s Ad Tracking Transparency feature is still being implemented and will change the app economy and ability to measure campaigns. However, Apple’s SKAdNetwork, an API for measurement of ad campaigns, continues to provide advertisers with a VTA measurement option, while maintaining the privacy of the users. This emphasises that advertisers should still consider VTA as part of iOS14 dedicated campaigns. TikTok has supported SKAN CTA since the rollout of iOS 14.5 in late April 2021. Starting from June 2021, TikTok has also started to support SKAN VTA via an open beta, with more tests to be conducted before an official general release.
The AppsFlyer report analysed over 14,600 apps, 10.39 billion installs, and 6.3 billion remarketing conversions, and takes into account both click-through attribution (CTA) and view-through attribution (VTA). CTA looks at installs made after clicking on an ad while VTA registers ad impressions that result in an install without the user immediately clicking on an ad. The app may sometimes be installed a day or two later and helps to outline a typical customer’s journey.
To view the full report, visit: https://www.appsflyer.com/resources/others/vta-insights-southeast-asia/
About AppsFlyer
AppsFlyer, the global attribution leader, empowers marketers to grow their business and innovate with a suite of comprehensive measurement and analytics solutions. Built around privacy by design, AppsFlyer takes a customer-centric approach to help 12,000+ brands and 8,000+ technology partners make better business decisions every day. To learn more, visit www.appsflyer.com.
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