Meta CAPI
Meta CAPI Benefits

Meta CAPI: The Solution to Boost Your Advertising Performance

New Challenges in Tracking: Less Effective Facebook Pixel

The world of tracking is constantly evolving, bringing new obstacles to data collection: ad blockers, the end of third-party cookies, and restrictions imposed by certain browsers like Safari. As a result, the Facebook Pixel has become less effective and can no longer provide optimal conversion tracking on Facebook and Instagram on its own. To overcome these challenges and enable advertisers to continue collecting robust data, the Meta Conversion API (CAPI) has become essential. Follow our guide to understand why implementing Meta CAPI is crucial for your ad campaigns and our recommendations for effective setup.

Meta Conversion API + Facebook Pixel, and Deduplication

Facebook CAPI and the traditional Facebook Pixel collect data differently. Unlike the Facebook Pixel, which gathers data directly in the browser and relies primarily on third-party cookies (client-side tracking), Meta CAPI uses server-side tracking. This means that Meta CAPI does not rely on third-party cookies but instead transmits user data from server to server, collecting more reliable data.

For now, Meta recommends using both tracking sources complementarily, activating dual tracking: Pixel + CAPI. Indeed, the Facebook Pixel remains the most effective source when third-party cookies are present(still used in browsers like Chrome). However, Meta CAPI is more effective on browsers that have already removed third-party cookies (like Safari/Firefox). By using this dual tracking, you have the most effective solution today to gather a good volume of data for your Meta campaigns, regardless of your users' browsers.

Recommendation for Dual Implementation of Facebook Pixel and Meta CAPI

Once both tracking sources are set up, Meta must deduplicate the events received twice. For this to work, you need to send an identical event ID through each tracking method, and Facebook will then perform event deduplication, counting the same event only once. However, if an event is not captured by the pixel but is sent via the server, Facebook will still retrieve that additional event.

Deduplication of an Event Captured by Both the Pixel and Meta CAPI Using the eventID on Meta-side

Data tracking then becomes fully optimized, maximizing the volume of conversions and the quality of data!

Addingwell Meta CAPI Tag: A Single Server-Side Tag with Effective Deduplication

However, this dual implementation recommendation from Meta remains problematic and does not fully deliver on the promises of server-side tracking.

  • No gain in web performance: You still need to trigger the pixel from the user's browser, so your site's loading time is not improved.
  • Your data governance is not improved: You keep the Facebook SDK in place on the browser side, meaning you do not have full control over the data sent to Meta.

Finally, the last problem is deduplication. You must ensure that you send the same event ID from both the pixel and CAPI, with a complementary setup.

To address these issues, the Addingwell Meta CAPI tag was created to efficiently handle this dual tracking: via the pixel AND the Meta Conversion API, but from a single server-side tag! This tag greatly simplifies the process by allowing you to:

  • Trigger CAPI and the pixel from a single tag, server-side. You no longer deploy the Facebook SDK on the browser side, gaining both in web performance and data governance.
  • Automatically send identical event IDs for both tracking methods, so you no longer have to worry about deduplication.
Addingwell Tag Recommendation for Dual Implementation of Facebook Pixel and Meta CAPI

Expected Benefits After Setup

After implementing both Meta CAPI and the pixel, along with bypassing ad blockers and circumventing Safari's ITP, your data will be more reliable and accurate. Our clients generally observe an increase in attributed conversions in their Meta ad manager!

Here is an example of what to expect after a successful implementation, showing a Purchase event in the Meta ad manager:

Data Received on Meta from META CAPI and Pixel

We can see here that 183 Purchase events were received on July 30 via Browser (from the pixel), and 230 events were received via Server (Meta CAPI). In total, 413 events were received by Meta on that day before deduplication.

In general, after deduplication, we can see up to 15% more events collected on Meta's side!

Next step

You now know why an advertiser should add Facebook Conversion API in addition to traditional pixel tracking. You have also seen how to simplify this transition to dual tracking with the server-side tag created for you by Addingwell. Congratulations, you are now ready to proceed with the tag setup