Home Affiliate Marketing & Advertising Are You Using Adsterra Targeting Settings Like a Pro? A Cheat Sheet for Affiliates

Are You Using Adsterra Targeting Settings Like a Pro? A Cheat Sheet for Affiliates

by Sasha Kasatkina
a blog cover for a post about Adsterra targeting settings

Hit or miss… Not the best way to plan an ad campaign, right? Anyway, that’s what some advertisers and affiliates practice when underestimating Adsterra targeting settings. Targeting can save thousands of dollars while making your ads reach the most motivated users.

With 20 traffic segmentation options on the Adsterra Self-Serve Platform, one can easily get confused or spend too much time testing them one by one. That’s far from perfect. So we decided to save your time and asked our expert Sasha to create an exhaustive guide to Adsterra targeting settings. Previously Sasha broke down the sorest topics of a campaign setup. Today we move further and dive deeper into the audience segmentation.


Sasha K - Adsterra expert
Sasha K.,
Key Account Manager at Adsterra

Hi, everyone, and welcome back to the series of skill-boosting guides to Adsterra features. Today our topic is targeting, and we are going to cover all additional settings that can help you reach the right users with the right ads in the right place with the best possible result. Most affiliates start with Adsterra Self-Serve Platform, so why don’t we also dive into its settings? Fasten up, sign up and let’s go!

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Basic Adsterra targeting settings available on the Self-Serve Platform

I remember that our topic today is Additional targeting. However, when you create a campaign, you set up general targeting first. Let’s revise the basic settings then. 

A screenshot with basic Adsterra targeting settings

Connection type

The Connection Type setting is vital when you target mobile carrier subscribers. It helps cut off Wi-Fi connection saving your money only for 3G and 4G users. 

Traffic type

Another vital step is setting up the type of users/traffic. Mainstream traffic fits best general offers like Ecommerce, Apps, VPN. Non-mainstream type is more about niche offers like iGaming or Niche Dating. But remember that wider targets reveal more opportunities for conversions. Adding alternative traffic types may be very beneficial; we laid out all nuts and bolts in the previous guide.

Device format

That’s one more essential option for traffic segmentation. You will need it very often when you’re running device-specific offers, since you can’t advertise the Mac OS X software for Android users.

Country

Well, even a global-scale campaign won’t run without GEOs in its target. This setting also defines your bidding strategy.

With Adsterra, you can either select countries one by one or use bulk input. I always recommend splitting your campaigns by countries since it simplifies the control over the rates and traffic behavior.

That was a brief outline of the Adsterra general campaign settings. They define those major traffic segments you target from the start. They’re enough for the first tests, but your true craft comes with additional targeting. So let’s carry on with these extras that can supercharge your campaign!

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Additional Adsterra targeting settings to optimize campaigns

Additional targeting settings that allow for cherry-picking your top audiences, those traffic slices that bring more clicks and conversions while not eating all your budgets 😉

Through the Self-Serve Platform, you can specify:

  • Operating system
  • Browser
  • Language
  • Carrier
  • Time range
  • Day of week

Our next step is to clarify all of these settings one by one.

OS targeting 

OS targeting is more than evident. You tweak settings to match only those users who have a specific operating system installed. When will you need to do so? It depends on the type of the offer you run. The OS targeting is an absolute MUST when you promote a Software or Utility offer, as these products are typically built for a specific OS.

What else? A wise move is to split your mobile iGaming, E-commerce, or Finance campaigns by OS, at least into two segments — iOS and Android.

iOS and Android users sometimes demonstrate totally different behavior patterns, and monitoring them separately will make your life easier, believe me. 

Note
To access OS targeting, you will first need to pick the Device type in the General campaign settings.

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OS version

A beneficial sub-targeting option is the OS version. With Software and Mobile apps campaigns, you will sometimes need to select users of a particular OS version, whether it’s Windows, macOS, or other. It often happens when the latest version of the software is unavailable for users of earlier versions, which means you should exclude those from your target.

With Adsterra, you can automate the OS choice. You won’t have to select every OS version you need manually. Just pick one option and then choose one of the bulk actions:

  • This version
  • Later than this version
  • This version and later
  • Earlier than this version
  • This version and earlier
a screenshot with options for OS version targeting

Then, you will put the toggle to Include or Exclude position, and voilà – your OS version targeting is all set up! Now let’s move to the Browser targeting.

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Browser targeting

It’s clear that Browser targeting is a must when you’re launching a campaign for, say, a Chrome Extension or a web application that runs only on Chrome and Safari. But this setting can help you a lot with almost any offer type.

While running a campaign, you will sometimes notice that users of a particular browser return you loads of clicks. Your move? Exactly! You will create a separate campaign targeting this browser with a higher payout. This will allow you to focus only on high-quality traffic without overspending.

The opposite is also correct: exclude those browsers that perform worse or packi them into one campaign while setting up the minimum bid.

How to choose browser versions
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Language

When you target by language, you select only those users whose browser language matches your target. This setting is necessary but a bit tricky. Here is why. Picking a specific browser language is great when you target, say, Spanish speakers in a non-Spanish speaking country like the UK. But this setting is obviously extra when you want to reach English speakers in the UK.

Mobile Carrier

To manage the Mobile Carrier setting, you will first need to pick these general options: Mobile Device, 3G Connection Type, and the Country, of course.

For every country, you will get a unique set of mobile carriers. I picked the 3G connection in the example below and chose Belgium as my target country. Here is the list of carriers we have here!

How to target subscribers of a particular mobile carrier

Mobile carrier targeting is vital when running a PIN Submit (aka Mobile Subscriptions) offer. Here, you will need to include only those using a specific mobile connection service provider.

One more hint here. If you have a list of IP addresses to include in your campaign, you can use it along with the Mobile Carrier setting. Scroll down to the Advanced settings section and paste the list of IPs. The IP range setting is only available in the include mode.

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Time Range and Day of Week

When you target by a time range, you decide when to show your ads and when to turn them off. That’s one of the most critical settings for Finance, Trading, and iGaming offers which often include a phone call as a part of the conversion flow. We also call it the click2call flow. It’s when a manager calls you back to confirm your registration or an automated call is made to give you a secret key to verify your subscription.

Most of the activities based on phone calls are tied to the call center’s working hours. And you don’t want to waste your money rotating ads when no one can call users back, right?

Choosing time ranges for exposing offers

Basically, any offers with limited access within a day will require the Time Range or Day of Week set. Some offers will only be valid on working days while spending your budgets in vain on weekends. 

Adsterra displays ads according to the server time, which is GMT ±0. So make sure your offer with “Call 555…and win” is ON within the hours you intend to run it. 

Well, we’re almost done with additional Adsterra targeting settings on the Self-Serve Platform. But I believe we must dig a bit deeper and check some brilliant extra options available for managed campaigns.

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Extra targeting options (for managed campaigns)

City targeting

City targeting is often helpful when running a Local Dating campaign or an offer tied to a specific location. iGaming offers commonly require targeting by cities. Like in the US, when in some cities, such offers are prohibited. We will need a “Country → Region → City” list from you to adjust this setting. 

With the list of cities, Adsterra managers can even make your ads sound more personalized. Like what? For instance, with Dating offers, we can add a tag that will switch the city’s name depending on the user’s location. A user from Birmingham will see “Looking for a date in Birmingham?” while a user in Bristol will get a chat invitation “You too, from Bristol?”

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UUID targeting

Today’s last option I would like to spotlight is Universally Unique Identifier Targeting or UUID. It’s pretty much like retargeting; only it focuses on conversions. Adsterra collects data about conversions while your campaign is running. Afterward, we will launch a follow-up campaign to reach all those who converted, prompting them to make another purchase or target action. It’s pretty much like the cross-selling process when you incite your active customers to buy additional products or get an extended license.

Let’s make up an example that will make it all clear. Let’s say you’re running a campaign for an Android app. Users seem to like the app since they keep installing it. In the end, you have multiple trials, but fewer paid subscriptions bought. What can we do? Exactly! We’ll set up another campaign that will target only those users who installed the app to make them buy a paid license or an extended pro version. That’s the most straightforward way to a higher CR.

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Let’s wrap up

That’s it about Adsterra targeting settings. You now know how to manage lots of options to adjust your campaigns, finding the best-converting targets. Remember that any campaign optimization comes after tests. Be careful with over-optimization, as narrowing down your targets may result in zero CR and very low traffic volumes. If in doubt, drop a line to a live chat: Adsterra managers will advise on the most fruitful targeting settings. And see you!

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