Audience Manager iterative destination files deliver repetitive information for the same users

Audience Manager

Audience Manager’s iterative sync destination files are set up to send the full data when the first file is generated and then send new data only that has not yet been sent to the destination partner.   While this process sounds simple, what classifies as “new data” depends on user actions and the way that the Audience manager platform perceives those actions.  As a result, there are couples of instances where apparently previously sent data is incorrectly being sent again, when in actuality the Audience Manager system has determined that it qualifies as new data.

The two reasons for resending of IDs and their subsequent segments or other data values are due to those users either requalifying for the underlying traits or a change in the ID sync that is used to determine the user information sent.

Let’s say that we have a segment entitled “Informational Pages”  to track and capture traffic how many visitors hit the informative pages (such as “About Us”, “Executive Team”, or “Profile” page).  Any visit to one of these pages qualify them to be part of the segment it has been mapped to and that realization is sent via outbound destinations.

If one of those visitors revisits a page tracked by the segment, they would update the corresponding trait realizations.  This new realization would in turn update their segment membership and would send that updated information to the destination partners a second time.

This situation would continue to occur until those individuals stop revisiting those pages and Audience Manager no longer records any new realizations.

For more information on Trait and Segment qualifications, refer our documentation: Signals, Traits, and Segments.

The Audience Manager outbound destination process relies on ID syncs to help identify and tie user information together.  As a result, Audience Manager sends data via a destination unless a sync has occurred.  At the same time, however, if a user has previously been synced with a particular partner and then a new ID sync is performed for that same partner, the Audience Manager system considers the new sync, a change to that “device” (or user) profile and it triggers any segments associated with that profile to be sent again via the destinations that are configured to use that sync.

Depending on how the syncs are being made with a particular partner, this situation is more or less likely to happen.

For more information about ID Syncing, refer our documentation: ID Synchronization for Inbound Data Transfers.