Advertising to kids is controversial, tricky at best, and easy to screw up. Which is why in early 2020, Apple shut down almost all data for brands looking to drive growth in the kids categories on the App Store.
That massively changed just recently with Apple’s introduction of SKAdNetwork. Everything is still privacy-safe, but there is now at least aggregated directional data on what’s working.
From my recent post on the Singular blog …
For everyone else in mobile marketing, the end of mobile advertising as we knew it happened just weeks ago when Apple finally released iOS 14.5. But kids-focused mobile app publishers had their privacy apocalypse way before: almost 18 months ago. Growth, measurement, and monetization in the kids category changed massively in early 2020, when Apple restricted access to the IDFA and other device and personal data in kids categories.
And back then, there was no SKAdNetwork to take the place of the IDFA.
Losing the IDFA in the iOS 14 privacy apocalypse and adapting to regular SKAdNetwork changes and updates has most mobile marketers living in a constantly changing Inception-style world.
But not publishers of kids’ apps.