Deep Diving Facebook Marketing - Playing with SDK and Pixel

First let me get this straight. If you don't have a Degree in Computer Science (like me), you will most likely need a developer's help for this. But this does not limit your ability to become a good digital marketer. In fact, executing everything from App/Web development to making marketing plans can be over exhausting.

Then again, you can always learn coding like HTML, CSS, Javascript, Objective-C, Swift and many more from the numerous tutorials available in the web. No hard and fast rule there.

However, the matter of a student of Computer Science becoming a good digital marketer or a marketing background guy becoming a digital guru - is a matter of debate and I'm not getting into that.

The main focus of this article would be the usage and importance of Facebook SDKs and Pixel for your business. If you are a developer, the scratch surface of all these - the "API" should also be considered. I'll be giving a link at the end of the article about the comparison between APIs and SDKs. But for now its SDK and Pixel that are the center of attention.

Simply put, an SDK (Software Development Kit) is used for advanced functionalities in an app such as advertisements (the Diaper's ad that you see after visiting a Grocery Shop App), Push notifications (The Promos that you from Uber or Pathao or other lifestyle apps in your phone's notification panel) & many more.

A Facebook Pixel is more simplified and is code that is placed on a website in order to track conversions and build audience for better targeting. A developer implements the Facebook SDKs in your app and Facebook Pixel in your website to fully utilize your marketing goals.

What can you do with Facebook SDKs:

• Run App installation Ads and track App installs.
• Track and Target audience by App Events.
• Run Conversion Ads for completing certain actions in your app
• Analyze the consumer/customer behavior that take actions in your app
• Many more.

Lets Break it down a bit:

Facebook SDK has 3 types of App events: Automatically Logged Events, Standard Events and Custom Events.

Automatically Logged events: Those events that Facebook tracks automatically such as app installs, in-app purchases etc. These events are recorded automatically and can be found regardless of implementing any other events in your app.

Marketing Use:

1. You can track people who frequently or infrequently launches your app. Based on the usage frequency, you can target high usage customers and give them incentives through ads such as "Token of Appreciation: 50% discount on your next order!".
2. You can target ads towards only those people who have installed your app. For instance, running a survey ad to know about the user's experience about the app.
3. Other strategies that is in line to your business.

Standard Events: These are preset events that Facebook has readily available for you. Some of the popular Standard events are: Add to Cart, Complete Registration, Initiate Checkout, Purchase and many more.

Marketing Use:

1. If you have an online shop app, then the "Add to cart" and "Initiate Checkout" are 2 most important events for you. Target people who have added your products to their cart previously. They are most likely to make the purchase if pushed through ad properly. Remember the smartphone ad you saw after adding that item in an app's add to cart and then didn't complete the purchase? That's because you triggered the event previously and the advertiser now wants to push you to purchase the item.
2. Suppose there's a new exclusive product that you want to sell and want to target those people who has viewed the product in your app recently. The View Content event is there to make it happen!
3. People who purchased a product from your app are more likely to purchase in the future. Create a loyal customer base from those who purchased your product. Just tell Facebook that you want to target your ad to those people who have made the "Purchase Event" in the past. Let Facebook do the rest!
4. Find some other useful events for your business here.

Custom Events:

This is where things can become a little tricky. So instead of getting into the nitty-gritty stuff, I'll try to explain it with an example.

Suppose you have 2 different forms in 2 different sections of an app. In one section, the form is for those who want to pre-order a product, and in the other section is a form who want to apply for loans. Now Facebook will count all form fill ups as a generalized event such as "Submit Application". In order to distinguish the 2 events, you need to set separate custom events for both with 2 different event names.

What can you do with Facebook Pixel:

Facebook Pixel is all that the SDK does except it does not have app install event and some other minor functionalities. Even if the platforms are different (One is app and the other is web), the services that a business offers are not much of difference.

Some commonly used events from Facebook Pixel Are:

• Add to basket
• Complete registration
• Lead
• Purchase

However, here you can also create custom conversion event. For example, you can create a custom event where the URL is of a specific category and record all the traffic who visited that page. The most common use of such events is that you can create custom audience and lookalike / value based lookalike audience and acquire them. Custom and lookalike audiences are a separate discussion and I'll try to bring them to light soon.

Important:

After implementing the SDKs or Pixel, it is important to test out if the events are triggering properly. Just go to the Events Manager of Facebook, select the source of events and click the Test Events option from the left bar. You can test the events live from there.

In this article I have tried to give an elementary view of the endless opportunities that can be achieved by the proper utilization of Facebook SDKs and Pixel.

As promised:

The comparison between API and SDK.

Hit me up for more interesting discussions regarding Facebook marketing and lets create a storm in a teacup!