Meta Conversions API extension overview

The Meta Conversions API allows you to connect your server-side marketing data to Meta technologies in order to optimize your ad targeting, decrease cost per action, and measure results. Events are linked to a Meta Pixel ID and are processed in a similar way to client-side events.

Using the Meta Conversions API extension, you can leverage the API’s capabilities in your event forwarding rules to send data to Meta from the Adobe Experience Platform Edge Network. This document covers how to install the extension and use its capabilities in an event forwarding rule.

Prerequisites

It is strongly recommended to use Meta Pixel and the Conversions API to share and send the same events from the client side and server side, respectively, since this may help recover events that were not picked up by Meta Pixel. Before installing the Conversions API extension, see the guide on the Meta Pixel extension for steps on how to integrate it in your client-side tag implementations.

NOTE

The section on event deduplication later in this document covers the steps to ensure the same event is not used twice, as it may be received from both the browser and the server.

In order to use the Conversions API extension, you must have access to event forwarding and have a valid Meta account with access to Ad Manager and Event Manager. Specifically, you must copy the ID of an existing Meta Pixel (or create a new Pixel instead) so the extension can be configured to your account.

Install the extension

To install the Meta Conversions API extension, navigate to the Data Collection UI or Experience Platform UI and select Event Forwarding from the left navigation. From here, select a property to add the extension to, or create a new property instead.

Once you have selected or created the desired property, select Extensions in the left navigation, then select the Catalog tab. Search for the Meta Conversions API card, then select Install.

The Install button being selected for the Meta Conversions API extension in the Data Collection UI.

In the configuration view that appears, you must provide the Pixel ID you copied earlier to link the extension to your account. You can paste the ID directly into the input, or you can use a data element instead.

You also need to provide an access token to use the Conversions API specifically. Refer to the Conversions API documentation on generating an access token for steps on how to obtain this value.

When finished, select Save

The Pixel ID provided as a data element in the extension configuration view.

The extension is installed and you can now employ its capabilities in your event forwarding rules.

Configure an event forwarding rule

This section covers how to use the Conversions API extension in a generic event forwarding rule. In practice, you should configure several rules in order to send all accepted standard events via Meta Pixel and Conversions API.

NOTE

Events should be sent in real time or as close to real time as possible for better ad campaign optimization.

Start creating a new event forwarding rule and configure its conditions as desired. When selecting the actions for the rule, select Meta Conversions API Extension for the extension, then select Send Conversions API Event for the action type.

The Send Page View action type being selected for a rule in the Data Collection UI.

Controls appear that allow you to configure the event data that will be sent to Meta via the Conversions API. These options can be entered directly into the provided inputs, or you can select existing data elements to represent the values instead. The config options are divided into four main sections as outlined below.

Config section Description
Server Event Parameters General information about the event, including the time it occurred and the source action that triggered it. Refer to the Meta developer documentation for more information on the standard event parameters accepted by the Conversions API.

If you are using both Meta Pixel and the Conversions API to send events, make sure to include both an Event Name (event_name) and Event ID (event_id) with every event, since these values are used for event deduplication.

You also have the option to Enable Limited Data Use to help comply with customer opt-outs. See the Conversions API documentation on data processing options for details on this feature.
Customer Information Parameters User identity data that is used to attribute the event to a customer. Some of these values must be hashed before they can be sent to the API.

To ensure a good common API connection and high event match quality (EMQ), it is recommended that you send all accepted customer information parameters alongside server events. These parameters should also be prioritized based on their importance and impact on EMQ.
Custom Data Additional data to be used for ads delivery optimization, provided in the form of a JSON object. Refer to the Conversions API documentation for more information on the accepted properties for this object.

If you are sending a purchase event, you must use this section to provide the required attributes currency and value.
Test Event This option is used to verify whether your configuration is causing server events to be received by Meta as expected. To use this feature, select the Send as Test Event checkbox, and then provide a test event code of your choice in the input below. Once the event forwarding rule is deployed, if you configured the extension and action correctly you should seeing activities appearing within the Test Events view in Meta Events Manager.

When finished, select Keep Changes to add the action to the rule configuration.

Keep Changes being selected for the action configuration.

When you are satisfied with the rule, select Save to Library. Finally, publish a new event forwarding build to enable the changes made to the library.

Event deduplication

As mentioned in the prerequisites section, it is recommended that you use both the Meta Pixel tag extension and the Conversions API event forwarding extension to send the same events from the client and server in a redundant setup. This can help recover events that were not picked up by one extension or the other.

If you are sending different event types from the client and server with no overlap between the two, then deduplication is not necessary. However, if any single event is shared by both Meta Pixel and the Conversions API, you must ensure that these redundant events are deduplicated so that your reporting is not adversely affected.

When sending shared events, make sure that you are including an event ID and name with every event that you send from both the client and server. When multiple events with the same ID and name are received, Meta automatically employs several strategies to deduplicate them and keep the most relevant data. See the Meta documentation on deduplication for Meta Pixel and Conversions API events for details on this process.

Next steps

This guide covered how to send server-side event data to Meta using the Meta Conversions API extension. From here, it is recommended to expand your integration by connecting more Pixels and sharing more events when applicable. Doing either of the following can help further improve your ad performance:

  • Connect any other Pixels that are not yet connected to a Conversions API integration.
  • If you are sending certain events exclusively through Meta Pixel on the client side, send these same events to the Conversions API from the server side as well.

See the Meta documentation on best practices for the Conversions API for more guidance on how to effectively implement your integration. For more general information on tags and event forwarding in Adobe Experience Cloud, refer to the tags overview.

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