History and Performance Best Practices
The following information will help you to understand and use the History and Performance tool more effectively.
Limit significant campaign changes in a day
When changes to the selected ad campaign cause visible impacts, the impact might appear on the History and Performance tool within one to three days of the change. If several changes occur to an ad campaign in one day, it can be difficult to discern the granular impacts of each change.
The recommended best practice is to limit significant campaign edits to one change per day. Limiting changes make it easier to identify the impact on performance with the History and Performance tool.
Note: The History and Performance tool doesn’t record campaign changes related to running out of budget or maxing out a daily cap.
Review common performance influences
When you notice a significant change in your campaign performance, but you’re unsure what might have caused the change, consider the following common causes:
Allow-list and Blocklist changes
The following allow- and blocklist actions can have a significant impact on your campaign reach:
| Change type | Description |
|---|---|
| Blocking new sources | When you use App targeting, Source bidding, or App category targeting to block additional sources in your campaign |
| Adding allow-list limitations | When you use targeting features to further limit which sources are allowed in your campaign |
If your campaign is struggling to get starts, clicks, and installs, try reducing your blocklist or widening your allowlist. If possible, consider removing blocklists completely.
Device targeting changes
Much like blocklisting, severely restricting your device targeting settings can have a negative impact on your performance.
If your campaign is struggling to get starts, clicks, and installs, try widening your device targeting settings.
ROAS bid and target changes
In a campaign that’s optimized for return on ad spend (ROAS), even very small changes to ROAS targets can have significant impacts.
If you notice a significant change in performance after changing your ROAS bids or targets, try restoring your previous bids or targets.
Creative pack changes
Both adding and removing creative packs in a live campaign can impact performance. Read the following guidelines to review how you can address these issues.
| Creative change type | Description | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Adding new creative packs | When you add a new creative pack to a live campaign | When you add a new creative to an ad campaign, the creative undergoes a period of exploration. During this time, the Unity models learn about your ad and its audience and where the creative will be most successful. Your ads will need a few days of exploration before they begin gathering starts effectively. |
| Removing existing creative packs | When you remove a creative pack from a live campaign | Removing a creative pack from your campaign does not ensure the traffic from that creative will go to your other creative packs in the campaign. |
If you want to speed up the exploration time of a new creative pack, try increasing your bids or decreasing your ROAS targets.
If you notice a significant decrease in campaign performance after you remove a creative pack, try restoring the old creative. If possible, use the exact same creative pack with the same creative ID.
Bid and budget changes
With all user acquisition campaigns, it’s important to monitor your daily caps and campaign budgets. Both leaving budgets unadjusted and changing budgets mid-campaign can impact your performance.
The following examples show how altering CPI bids or reaching budget caps without adjusting your budgets can affect campaign performance:
| Budget change type | Description | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Changed CPI bids without updating the daily budget | When you use manual bidding to increase your CPI bids in an install campaign without increasing your daily cap | If you use manual bidding to increase your CPI bids, your campaign might begin acquiring starts quickly early in the day and reach its daily cap sooner. As a result, your campaign can’t make bids later in the day, and its performance might decrease. |
| Decreased or expended budgets | When you decrease your daily budget limit or spend all of your overall campaign budget | Changing budgets is recorded in the History and Performance tool, but reaching caps and limits through campaign activity isn't. |
If you make changes to your CPI bids or ROAS targets, ensure that you adjust your daily budget accordingly.
If you notice a significant decrease in campaign performance due to budget limitations, try increasing your daily caps or your overall campaign budget.
For static install (CPI) campaigns, you can use Automated bidding to dynamically get the most starts for your budget.
Note: Because the History and Performance tool only tracks changes you make to your campaign, it can display changes you make to your budgets. However, it can’t display daily or campaign budgets being exhausted.
Consider other influences on campaign performance
Some campaign performance changes might not be due to direct edits to your ad campaign. For example, if there’s an external change to competition for the audiences you’re targeting, your campaign performance could be significantly impacted.
If you observe a noticeable change in your campaign performance, and you haven't made any changes in the last three days, it's likely due to external factors rather than direct ad campaign changes.