StackAdapt Quick Start Guide

Send advertising events directly to StackAdapt

Destination Info

Client-side
Server-side

Web

Mobile

Server

Getting Started

Configure Freshpaint destination

  1. Make sure you have the appropriate access in both Freshpaint and Viant:

    1. Contact your Freshpaint Account Manager to request access to this destination. Once you have that, we will help you step by step through the configuration process.

  2. Create your conversion funnel, and create events in Freshpaint to track your conversions.

  3. Since StackAdapt only uses unique click IDs and Conversion Event IDs, there is no access token or Pixel ID required to set up the destination.

    1. You can configure your StackAdapt destination in Freshpaint by using the link provided here or by navigating to Apps > StackAdapt > Configure StackAdapt in the Freshpaint console.

    2. In the destination, click the Configure button on the Configuration row and click Save.

Once you've enabled the destination, you're ready to start setting up the campaign and conversion events in StackAdapt!

Configure Conversion Events

To send a conversion event to StackAdapt, you need to set up an event in StackAdapt and map your Freshpaint event to that event unique ID.

In StackAdapt:

  1. From the StackAdapt Pixel page, click Create New and select Conversion Event.

  2. Select Website as the Install Location and Page Load as the Activation Method (even if you're not targeting page loads).

  3. Select Standalone Pixel as the install method, leaving the default of Javascript.

  4. Give your event a name, select the appropriate Conversion Category, and fill out any other fields relevant to the conversion event. Select Create Pixel Code once finished.

  5. Click Finish, ignoring the autogenerated Javascript code. Copy the Conversion Event Unique ID for the newly created event once back on the Conversion Events dashboard.

When setting up a conversion event in StackAdapt, you can select either 'click-through' or 'view-through and click-through'. 'View-through and click-through' is the default setting. When the default setting is enabled, the platform will attribute to both impressions and clicks. You convert the event in StackAdapt from 'click-through' to a 'view-through & click-through' at anytime.

To send an event to StackAdapt, you'll need to enable the destination for the event in Freshpaint:

  1. If you'd like to send an autotrack event from your event library to StackAdapt, navigate to your Freshpaint event definition and toggle the destination on to enable the event to be sent to StackAdapt. You'll follow the steps below to add the Conversion Event Unique ID. If you're using Google Tag Manager, you can skip to step 2 below.

    1. Return to the StackAdapt Destination in the Freshpaint console and configure a transformation to map one of your Freshpaint events to the StackAdapt Conversion Event. Click "Configure" next to "Event Transformations".

    2. Click "+ New Transformation"

    3. Select "Modify Data". Choose the event you'd like to send to StackAdapt, select the StackAdapt destination, click "Enable it?" if the event is not yet configured for StackAdapt, and click Save.

    4. Once in the transformation edit page, add a new transformation of type Send Constant Property

    5. Set the Property Value to the Conversion Event Unique ID (copied from the StackAdapt Conversion Events page), the Constant Type to Text, and the Property Name to conversion_id.

  1. If you're using Google Tag Manager to send data to StackAdapt, you'd simply create a tag with the Freshpaint tag template in Google Tag Manager and select the tag type "StackAdapt". In this case, you just need to specify StackAdapt Conversion Event Unique ID in the event tag, no transformation necessary.

Once you've set up the transformation with the StackAdapt Conversion Event Unique ID, you're ready to start sending events to StackAdapt via Freshpaint!

Note that these instructions cover both click-through and view-through events. Freshpaint will automatically forward events to StackAdapt's click-through conversion endpoint if $sapid (StackAdapt click ID) is present and to StackAdapt's view-through conversion endpoint if no $sapid is present.

If you are a HIPAA account, you will need to add event properties to the allowlist. If you are not a HIPAA account, you can skip this step.

Freshpaint has the properties needed for StackAdapt conversion events listed under Required Properties. There are additional properties needed for Retargeting events listed under Recommended Properties.

Property Requirements:

  • Conversion Events: conversion_id, $sapid (only required for click-through conversions), $ip (only required for view-through conversions)

  • Retargeting Events: retargeting_id, $ip, $user_agent

When setting up a conversion event in StackAdapt, you can select either 'click-through' or 'view-through and click-through'. 'View-through and click-through' is the default setting. When the default setting is enabled, the platform will attribute to both impressions and clicks. You convert the event in StackAdapt from 'click-through' to a 'view-through & click-through' at anytime.

Set up Test Campaign and Configure in StackAdapt

  1. Set up a test campaign that targets a small audiences and set a low budget ($10-50 budget).

  2. In order for Freshpaint to be able to automatically capture the click ID auto-generated by the StackAdapt advertisement, the click ID needs to be specified as a macro in the campaign Click URL.

    1. Navigate to the Overview tab in the StackAdapt portal, and click on your campaign. Click on the Creative tab and add sapid={SA_POSTBACK_ID} as a query parameter to your Click URL. A preview of the query parameters will show up under the Click URL that you can use to confirm that the query parameters are properly configured.

  3. Verify in Freshpaint that the events triggering and flowing through to successfully to StackAdapt by using Freshpaint's Liveview and Event Verification tools

Confirm events are triggering and sending to StackAdapt successfully

To check whether StackAdapt is receiving events, you can go to Pixel > Conversion Events within your StackAdapt account, which will show you when the last time StackAdapt received an event for each Conversion Event.

Conversions may take up to 2 hours to appear in your StackAdapt portal

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