How to Become a Mobile-Implementation Ninja: Tips and Tricks

What makes an individual a ninja? The formal definition of a ninja is “a person trained in ancient Japanese martial arts and employed especially for espionage and assassinations.” That’s grim, I know. But, I found another definition, this time in the Oxford dictionary: “a person who excels in a particular skill or activity.” That’s what I want to talk about here. To help you become a mobile-implementation ninja, I have some great tips and tricks — primarily based in our Adobe Core Services solution — some of which will also help leverage the power of mobile analytics.

To become a mobile-implementation ninja, you need three things:

1. Precision,
2. Fundamental skills, and
3. An array of special moves, deployed through powerful tools.

When I think of a ninja, I remember video games I played in which the warriors would deploy “finishing moves” when the opponent was running out of strength. As the battle progressed, the moves became more powerful. This is the approach I advise customers to take as they develop their mobile app measurement strategies. So, let me provide you with some basic skills and help you maximize the precision of your moves and finish off your mobile implementation with some ninja finishing moves.

Basic Mobile-Ninja Skills
First, let’s learn some new basic skills!

Know Your JSON config file.
I like to think of the JSON config file as the brains of the mobile software-development kit (SDK) operation. This file is fully configurable through the mobile services user interface. One of the most important settings is LifecycleTimeout. By default, it’s set to 300 seconds. This setting determines how long your app can be in the background before triggering a new app-launch event, and I recommend that you tune it based on your app’s average session length. Also, you can enable mobile app acquisition by setting the ReferrerTimeout to a value greater than 0, which is the primary way to collect mobile app-acquisition links in Mobile Core Services.

Switch JSON at Runtime.
A constant issue I’ve noticed is that clients will use a JSON config file that points to a development or preproduction report suite while they’re still developing the app. In the rush to publish apps to app stores, this setting is sometimes overlooked, and you’re left with data that’s being sent to your development report suite. But, you are able to override the location of the JSON config file at runtime, giving you the option to toggle between a development config file for testing and a production config file for your launch!

Special Moves to Improve Tracking
Now, let’s move on to maximizing the precision of your moves!

Utilize the “Secret Menu” of SDK Variables.
The Adobe SDK collects the majority of its data via context-data variables, but there are a couple of exceptions. There are variables you can call if you want to set up specialized use cases:

• &&products/eVar — The products variable must be set using this specialized syntax. If you have merchandising eVars you want to send in along with the products variable, you can call them out specifically as eVar in the products string.
• &&events — We only recommend using this if you’re using serialized events. For example, if you are a retailer, you can serialize an event (like the purchase event) so it isn’t counted more than once. Unfortunately, processing rules can’t do event serialization, so set this variable for more precise tracking.
• &&tnt — When using Adobe Target, set this variable to send data into Target.
• &&currencyCode — One of my new favorites! Again, this can’t be done via processing rules, so use this variable to denote the currency-code conversion.

Keep Tracking in the Background.
This one is a cautionary tale more than a tip. If you’re going to have tracking services (like notification- or location-based services) that will ‘wake up’ your app in the background, make sure to use the proper tracking calls to prevent these services from inadvertently triggering Analytics calls.

Finishing Moves — The Awesome Ones!
And finally, we get to the good stuff!

Track App to Web Handoff.
Many apps will use a combination of native app screens and web-views that are formatted to appear as if they’re loaded from within the app. You can track a seamless visitor handoff from your app to your web-view by syncing the Visitor ID across the two platforms. You can do this by determining which Visitor IDs you have set within your app (including the Adobe Marketing Cloud ID) and sending them to be collected and used in the web-view. This will help you avoid a broken journey, which happens when a different Visitor ID is set as the user moves between the app and the web-view.

Trigger an In-App Message From an Adobe Audience Manager (AAM) Segment.
Yes, you can do this! In the Adobe mobile SDK, Adobe Audience Manager returns segment/audience information via JSON response. You can fetch the JSON response, parse the segment ID values, and pass them into Analytics as a comma-delimited context-data variable. Once this variable is collected by Analytics, you have the ability to use the value(s) to trigger an in-app message in real time based on the values you set. Conversely, you could use it later to send push notifications to selected segments of your app users. Awesome!

Now, Become the Mobile-Implementation Ninja You Were Meant to Be!
Use these mobile-implementation tips and tricks to gain the most from your mobile app analytics solution. For more, check out my mobile-implementation session at this year’s Adobe Summit — session #358.

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from Digital Marketing Blog by Adobe https://blogs.adobe.com/digitalmarketing/mobile/summit-session-358-become-a-mobile-implementation-ninja-pro-tips-and-tricks/