How CPA Goal works?

CPA Goal is an advanced algorithm that drives conversions at an affordable CPM or CPC. You command it to unlink placements that don't match your desired CPA (eCPA) or the number of conversions, and auto-optimization sets live! This solves the primary issue of massive traffic acquisition: turning quantity into quality while saving ad budgets.

Important updates: You can now add up to two CPA Goal rules per campaign, combining filters by conversions and by eCPA. Stats reports are available right after the launch, so you can fine-tune criteria more accurately and achieve the ideal balance between cost and target actions.

*You can also return unlinked placements to your ad campaign if you want them to deliver conversions anyway. We'll get this topic covered in the FAQ section at the end of this guide.

This feature is vitally important for advertisers who put user actions (CPA) as their KPI but acquire traffic using CPM or CPC pricing models.

Formerly, you had to manually blacklist placements that spent too much and delivered poor results. Now, you possess a game-changing tool to save CPM/CPC budgets and continue getting the best traffic.

CPA Goal automatically unlinks placements that get flagged by the criteria you set, either eCPA or the number of conversions. No more jumping between your tracker and Adsterra to create a blacklist: our intelligent algorithm will do all the jobs and keep an eye on your ad spend.

eCPA stands for “effective cost of conversion.” The eCPA formula will be = Spending / Number of conversions.

We explained the whole ad automation process in this short tutorial. You will learn how to optimize spend, identify the most-converting traffic slices, and monitor conversion data and overall campaign performance.

You maximize ad spend and enhance performance when buying CPM or CPC traffic. Three parameters are needed here:

Let's see how a rule works. First, you enter a critical spending amount. Upon reaching this spending, our algorithm will check if an ad placement complies with the next vital parameters:

Here is how CPA Goal helped our direct advertiser, a local online store. A Brazilian e-mall was launching a promotion aiming to embrace new audiences. Thanks to smart rules, our advertiser managed to reduce eCPA almost by half, while growing the number of shopping orders and ROI.

​Background:

1st campaign

2nd campaign – with CPA goal rules

Smart rules allow for managing huge traffic volumes and achieve your desirable KPIs (conversion price or volume) much faster.

You need an Advertiser's account. Please remember to confirm your email while registering.

Your next step after the registration — if you plan to acquire traffic — is putting funds, but we will now skip this part. With Adsterra, you can access any feature without topping up the account.

S2S tracking is a must for any conversion-based activities, so please ensure you have set it up.

From the vertical menu, hit Campaigns > Create.

To go live, you'll need to enter all Required Settings. Please add your campaign name, pick the ad unit (e.g., In-Page Push), choose traffic and connection type, decide on the device type, and add your landing page's URL.

Remember to include the ##SUB_ID_SHORT(action)## token to the URL and match it with your tracker's “clickID”.

To enable further optimization, pick CPM or CPC pricing type. Please note that if you select a CPA campaign, the CPA Goal setup option will not appear on the page.

Now choose a country and add a payout (bid). You can use the Traffic Estimator's clues and enter the recommended bid.

One step left to enable CPA Goal: jump to Step 4 – Advanced settings. Scroll to the CPA Goal section. Let's now add a new rule.

Ok, you're about to add a new rule. Use any of the following 2 methods. From the drop-down list 'Select CPA rule' select Custom to add a unique rule per campaign. Or, click on the CPA Goal page link to add a rule you will then apply as many times as needed.

Let's now select Custom. First, enter the critical spending amount (the money limit per placement). By hitting it, you command Adsterra's intelligent algorithms to check all ad placements. Please enter this amount in the Spent field ($).

Next, add one of the optimization parameters that will signal our system to unlink a placement if it hits this mark. It can be either eCPA or the number of conversions.

Leave this rule as is, or add one more condition! The same way as before, enter the spend amount you're ready to pay for traffic acquisition per placement. Next, fill in the fields of the second rule.

Both rules will operate based on the "OR" logic. See the example below:

The rule will unlink a placement if its eCPA exceeds $10 with a spend limit of $10. Or, the same rule will check if a placement delivers fewer than 10 conversions while spending $10.

Click ADD RULE in the end. And let's wrap up the setup process!

As soon as you add the rule and click the SUBMIT FOR REVIEW button, your campaign will enter a verification stage. After we verify your campaign, you will be able to set it live, and the smart algorithm will be applied immediately to all CPM/CPC traffic sources.

There is a more convenient way to create, adjust, and update the rules for smart optimization. From the vertical navigation bar, hit Campaigns > CPA Goal rules. On a new page, you can create rules to easily apply them to any campaign.

Below is the list of all optimization rules added. By clicking the Edit icon, you can correct the parameters, and the changes will be applied immediately. Complex rules are also available!

We've made sure it's an advanced optimization strategy powered by intelligent algorithms. It allows advertisers and affiliate marketers to reach the target payout for a conversion (CPA) while purchasing CPM or CPC traffic.

You pay less for traffic since they pay for ad impressions or clicks but achieve better results by optimizing this traffic by conversions or eCPA.

If you an advertiser or affiliate marketer, you need to try it out. It's an updated optimization tool that uses real data to deliver you both target actions and acceptable conversion cost.

Both CPA Goal and Target CPA (or CPA Target) use smart algorithms to adjust spending based on performance metrics. But there is a difference in how they work. Target CPA bidding analyzes and optimizes bids using historical data and competitor signals from the same auction. With Target CPA, you maintain the average cost per conversion (target cost) you're aiming at. On the contrary, CPA Goal asks you to enter critical parameters to filter out ad placements unlikely to drive enough high-quality conversions.

Yes, our system implements advanced machine learning algorithms to optimize CPM/CPC traffic for conversions and eCPA. These algorithms carry out complex data analysis to identify and select ad placements that align with your KPIs.

Adsterra CPA Goal is not a bidding model or an automated bidding algorithm (like on Google or Apple Ads). Instead, it is an optimization algorithm that can be applied to CPM or CPC traffic. It enables you to automatically remove ad placements and exclude those that produce fewer conversions or cost too much.

The tool may not be suitable for all campaigns. It requires a substantial number of impressions within your targeting, and it may not be the ideal tool for complex, expensive conversions like purchases and orders. If your campaign involves such conversions and you're new to Adsterra, it is better to run a classic CPM campaign and manually optimize traffic slice by slice. Previously, we published a guide to running E-commerce ads where we listed several pro tips from our experts.

With some offers and products, it is much cheaper to buy impressions or clicks. In E-commerce, for instance, every user action costs pretty much. But when you purchase CPM/CPC traffic, you can try all targets and embrace more impressions while keeping your KPIs safe thanks to smart optimization.

Sure! From the CPA Goal Rules page, you can select a rule needed and make changes. They will be automatically applied to ad campaigns when they've been included. If you created a Custom rule per campaign, you'll be able to edit it when editing this campaign.

It depends on many factors, such as your strategy, your vertical, your targeting, and more. If you notice you don't get enough traffic, it is better to recheck the current amount of traffic available for your geo (you can do it using Traffic Chart) and the recommended bid.

Optimizing for CPA requires refining targeting settings, improving landing pages, rethinking bidding strategies, and refreshing ad creatives. Use in-platform stats reports or data from your tracker to analyze historical data of campaign results; this helps set competitive CPA goals. Also, you can try automated bidding strategies like Smart CPM to reduce spending, but this will not be a conversion-based approach.

Open your current campaign with an active rule and scroll down to the Advanced settings section. All unlinked placements will be listed in a table.

In this table, you can see all the IDs excluded from your current campaign and the date they were unlinked. You can look for a specific placement ID using the search field, select and copy IDs, and download all unlinked placements as a CSV to save it as a blacklist for your further campaigns.

And the most important move: you can remove the placement or a group from this list, returning them to your campaign. To do so, select one or several placements and hit Remove selected IDs.

Of course. You can create, edit, and save as many rules as needed and apply them to any of your campaigns from the CPA Goal rules page.

You can add a rule to any of your current ad groups. The tool analyzes statistics for the current month. This means that it will analyze all placements for the current month, as well, and next, unlink those that don't meet your criteria.