How to Track Your SamCart Subscriptions in Facebook Advertising
You’re about to put your computer to sleep for the evening when it hits you. You’ve been tracking your Facebook Ads’ performance with SamCart's Smart Conversion Pixel Tracking for a while now, but you just realized a critical piece of the puzzle is missing. You aren’t tracking your subscription charges. How do you know which Facebook Ads are most effective for converting trials into customers? Which ads are bringing in the highest lifetime customer value (LTV)? As essential as it is to track which leads are converting initial orders, if you’re selling subscriptions, payment plans, or trials in SamCart, it’s imperative that you account for recurring sales as well. Without that critical step, it’s almost impossible to accurately gauge your return on investment. Rest easy. A little-known Facebook event called Offline Conversions can provide the info you seek. Offline Conversions are usually used by those looking to attribute in-person sales to a Facebook Ad. For our purposes, however, we’re going to use SamCart and Zapier to have Offline Conversions track your subscription charges and match them to their corresponding Ad campaign. This post will teach you how to use Offline Conversions to track all that money you’re making with SamCart in your sleep! We’ll break down:
1. Set up Your Facebook Ads Account for Tracking Offline Conversions
Getting started with Offline Conversions is a breeze. To begin, head over to your Facebook Events Manager. Click Add Data Source and then Offline Event Set to create a new Offline Event Set.
Select which Ad Accounts you’d like to assign the event to. For the purposes of tracking recurring charges, make sure you enable Auto-Tracking, as shown below: [caption id="attachment_4590" align="alignnone" width="586"]
Don't forget to enable Auto-Tracking for your Offline Conversion.[/caption] Auto-Tracking ensures that your new Offline Events will be associated with all future Ad campaigns in the selected Ad Accounts. Click Next to officially create your Offline Event Set. You’re on your way to gaining loads of new insight into your Ad performance!
2. Create a Zapier Zap That Links Your Recurring SamCart Charges to Your Facebook Ads
Now that you've created your Offline Event Set, you need a way for SamCart to send data associated with a recurring charge over to your Facebook Ads. This is where Zapier comes in. Zapier’s “Zaps” act as a bridge between SamCart and Facebook Ads, transporting customer and subscription information tied to a recurring charge from SamCart to your Facebook Ads Manager. This process sounds intimidating but is actually quite simple. Let’s create a Zap together ⚡ Start by heading over to your Zapier Dashboard and clicking Make a Zap! in the upper right-hand corner of the page.
On the following page, search for SamCart under “Choose a Trigger App” and select it. You’ll then be prompted to “Select a SamCart Trigger’.” Choose Subscription Charged, which will account for any recurring charge inside of SamCart, and hit Save + Continue. [caption id="attachment_4589" align="alignnone" width="592"]
Choose a SamCart "Subscription Charged" event as the trigger for your Offline Conversion Zap[/caption] Next, select the SamCart Marketplace you wish to connect to Zapier. If you haven’t yet connected your Marketplace to Zapier, login to your SamCart Marketplace in a separate tab before heading back to Zapier and clicking Connect an Account at the bottom of the page. Hit Accept in the window that pops up, and SamCart will do the rest. You're ready to create a Zap! Click Fetch & Continue, and Zapier will automatically retrieve information from the last recurring charge in your SamCart Marketplace. Now that you've set up your trigger (a SamCart Subscription Charge), you need to define the action you'd like to associate with the trigger. Under Choose an Action App, search for “Facebook” and select Facebook Offline Conversions. Make sure Send Offline Event is selected on the following page, and hit Continue. If you already have your Facebook account connected to Zapier, hit Continue. If not, click Connect Account, and Zapier will walk you through connecting your Facebook account to Zapier. [caption id="attachment_4593" align="alignnone" width="636"]
Choose "Facebook Offline Conversions" as your Zap's action.[/caption] We’re almost there! Under Set up Facebook Offline Conversions Offline Event, match each field to the SamCart charge data Zapier retrieved from your last recurring charge. The more information you can fill in here, the more data Facebook has to match the Subscriber to their corresponding Ad. Once you’ve matched all the subscription data you have to Zapier’s fields, hit Continue and then select Send Test to Facebook Offline Conversions on the following page. That’s it! Name your Zap, turn it on, and from here on out each SamCart recurring charge will be matched to your Facebook Ads. You can’t manage what you can’t track. Now you have a ton of new insight at your disposal!
3. Upload Existing Offline Event Data to Facebook
So you've set up your Offline Event in Facebook, and your shiny new Zap is attributing all of your new recurring charges to Facebook Ads, but what about all the recurring charges you’ve already collected? Getting business-induced FOMO again? Relax! We’ve got you covered. Facebook lets you upload past subscription charges and will then match said charges to the Ad that converted them. Start by heading to your SamCart Charges report and exporting Successful Charges. Open the .csv in your spreadsheet application of choice, filter the data by Charge Source, and select Recurring. If you’re looking to import charges that are more than 90 days old, we recommend exporting the charges from Stripe/PayPal. [caption id="attachment_4594" align="alignnone" width="679"]
Export your recurring charges directly from SamCart![/caption] Next, head to your Facebook Events Manager, select Offline Events, and click Upload Offline Events:
Finally, upload the .csv you exported from SamCart or Stripe. Facebook will help you map your data to its required formatting, and will give you an estimate regarding what percentage of your upload is likely to match an Ad campaign. If you run into any roadblocks with your upload, we recommend using Facebook’s official Help Center.
4. Make Informed Decisions Based on Your Findings
Now that you have all of this new information, it’s time to start putting it to use! Facebook Ads can be expensive, so it’s critical for any business based on recurring revenue to make decisions that drive long-term customers. When judging the success of an Ad campaign, most entrepreneurs think about impressions and conversions. "How many people saw my Ad? How many people clicked on it, and did those leads turn into customers?" If you’re using SamCart’s Trials, Payment Plans, or Subscriptions, here are some additional questions you should be asking:
- Which Ad led to the highest Long-Term Customer Value?
It’s entirely possible you ran an Ad that excelled at converting new customers, but did a poor job of bringing in customers with a high lifetime value (LTV). LTV is defined as “The prediction of net profit associated with the entire relationship for a single customer.” Regardless of what you’re selling, LTV is perhaps the most important metric you can track. If you’re selling recurring products, it’s even more valuable. A lengthy and reliable customer relationship is likely far more valuable to your business than just getting customers through the door, so identify which Ads brought in your most valuable customers, and consider why those Ads appealed to your ideal customer. After you’ve determined which Ads brought you your most valuable customers, consider making a Lookalike Audience. These draw on your current customer data to discover and target similar audiences on Facebook, and are incredibly effective for delivering ads to your best customers. Running already successful Ads to an audience that’s proven to be successful is like copy and pasting valuable customers. It’s almost unfair!
- Did this Ad convert trials into customers?
If you’re selling products with a trial, it’s important to look at which ads turned the most trials into paying customers. Again, certain ads might be great for getting people in the door, but if these trials aren’t converting into customers and paying full price for your products, you’re throwing money at the wrong Ad.
- Is my messaging focused on the right audience?
If you’re not ready for a deep dive into Facebook’s more advanced features, such as Lookalike Audiences, we recommend really thinking about the demographic data associated with your most valuable customers. What did the Ads that brought those customers to you have in common? It’s easy to throw money at Facebook Ads just for a spike in conversions. It feels good to see quick results, but if you rely heavily on recurring business, immediate success can occasionally be a poor predictor of long term profitability. It’s more important and also more challenging to create messaging that speaks to your ideal customer -- the ones who are willing and able to pay you for recurring purchases over an extended period of time.
Conclusion:
We often see SamCart users get overwhelmed by the ins and outs of Facebook Ads. There are tons of tools available, and the data can easily be offputting if you're just getting started. But you don't need to be a tech wizard to make the most of your Ad investment. Paying attention to which Ads are bringing you the greatest return on investment is always a useful exercise, and simply accessing the data related to your subscription charges is valuable in itself. Give this Zap a try, and leave a comment below to let us know what you discover!
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