In last week’s blog post, I discussed with you possibly one of the biggest news bomb ever dropped by Apple; the iOS 14 Privacy Updates. With Facebook scrambling to find ways to work around those upcoming changes and save their biggest stream of income, it seems that they also took this opportunity to evaluate a couple of their tools and make changes to their own platforms as well. One of those changes, which they quietly announced a couple of weeks ago, is to permanently get rid of Facebook Analytics, as of June 30, 2021. So, what does that mean for us? What will happen now? Let’s discuss...
What is Facebook Analytics?
So, first things first, what exactly is Facebook Analytics?
Simply put, Facebook Analytics is pretty much Facebook’s own version of Google Analytics. This free tool helps you better understand the following:
How do people use your app, website, Facebook page, or other event sources, INCLUDING how they move in between all of those event sources
Demographic information about the users who interact with your website, app, page, or other event sources
How different groups, segmented according to your own preferences, interact with your event sources
Why is Facebook getting rid of it?
Now, before you go into a panic mood, rest assured that the end of the Facebook analytics era is NOT a big deal. In fact, the reason that Facebook is getting rid of it is that not enough people use this tool to justify its existence! Getting rid of it would mean one thing less for them to maintain, right?
Either way, according to a recent article by Ad Exchanger, developers who tracked the sort of data that Facebook Analytics made available to them weren’t using Facebook Analytics; they were actually using competing software. The only usage they had of Facebook Analytics was when they wanted to take a quick glance at the demographics of the users on their websites. However, this was only something considered to be a “nice-to-have”, not something that they couldn't go without.
What alternatives do we have now?
The first thing Facebook recommends you do if you are a user of Facebook Analytics is to export all of your data, as it will all be lost as of June 30, 2021.
That being said, Facebook still leaves plenty of powerful tools available to you to keep tracking the information you need, such as:
Facebook Business Suite: This suite allows you to know everything there is to know about your audience, content, and trends on both Facebook and Instagram. Keep in mind that this may not be available to you yet, as Facebook is still working on rolling this out for all of its users.
Ads Manager: This fantastic tool allows you to keep track of every penny you spend on advertising and the results you are getting from your advertising efforts on Facebook and Instagram
Events Manager: This tool allows you to view reports on the events that you set up (either through your pixel or Conversions API)
So, there you have it! I believe that it is safe to conclude that we will all do just fine without Facebook Analytics. If I learned anything throughout my marketing career, it's that most of us didn't even know that Facebook Analytics existed, thanks to all the other tools that they make available to us.
Got questions? An opinion? Feel free to share with me in the comments section below or contact me; I’m here to help!