Audience FAQs

Common questions about Ours Privacy audiences: HIPAA and BAAs, hashed identifiers, audience naming, match rates, consent, sync frequency, limits, and permissions.

Common questions about building, naming, exporting, and syncing audiences. For the underlying model, see Audience concepts.

Compliance and privacy

Not as protected health information or consumer health data. Advertising platforms do not sign business associate agreements and their terms prohibit it. Whether a given audience crosses that line is a question for your counsel. See Compliance for audiences.

What should I call an audience I am about to sync?

Something meaningless. The platform displays the Export Name, so put the description in Name and press Generate. See Export names.

Do my conditions reach the destination?

No. A sync sends the Export Name and the enabled identifiers for each member, nothing else.

You decide who is included. Add a consent condition in Visitor Properties, and every sync and CSV carries only the people who meet it. A sync and a CSV both send the audience exactly as you define it. See Compliance for audiences.

Accepting the terms and selecting destinations are governed by permissions. Ask your account administrator.

Building audiences

What is the difference between Visitor Properties and Event Behavior?

Visitor Properties filter on who someone is. Event Behavior filters on what they did, as a count inside a rolling window. A visitor has to satisfy both sections.

How do I exclude people who already converted?

Add an event condition for the conversion event with a count of exactly 0. See Event conditions.

My page view condition matches almost everybody. Why?

Every page fires a page view. Add a nested condition on the page URL.

Should I use the current or the initial attribution properties?

Initial, for almost everything. They record how the visitor first found you.

Can I build an audience from an experiment variant?

Yes. Use From experiment in the Event Behavior card. See Experimentation.

How fresh is the data?

An audience built on this morning's behavior works this afternoon.

Is a preview count exact?

It is an estimate, and the right number for sanity-checking a definition. It is not how many people a platform will recognize, which is always lower.

Can I copy an audience?

Yes. Duplicate it from the audience list and edit the copy.

Exporting

What are the three export formats for?

All Fields is raw values for CRM uploads and analysis. Google Ads Format and Facebook Ads Format are hashed and formatted for uploading to those platforms by hand. See Exporting a CSV.

Why does my export say only some rows had matchable data?

A platform can only match on an email or phone number, so rows without one are left out of the file. A large gap is telling you about your data collection. Add an Email is not null condition to see the deliverable size in Preview.

How long can I download an export?

For a limited time under Recent Exports, after which you run it again. If a download link stops working, press Download again.

Why is Export CSV greyed out?

The audience needs a name, at least one condition, and no unsaved changes.

Syncing

How often does a sync run?

Once a day. There is nothing to schedule.

Does a sync add people, or replace the list?

It depends on the destination. Vibe and Meta replace the full list each run. Google refreshes it one day at a time. MNTN adds members but does not remove them. Mailchimp and Braze add and remove a tag or attribute value. See Audience Destinations.

Which platforms can I sync to?

Vibe CTV Audiences, MNTN Audiences, Facebook Custom Audiences, Google Customer Match, Mailchimp Audience Tags, and Braze Audiences.

Can I sync an audience to a destination I already use for events?

Yes, through its Audience Destination. Event destinations receive events and Audience Destinations receive membership, so add the matching Audience Destination alongside the one you already use.

Why did my sync get skipped?

The destination is disabled, the audience is not published, or the destination has not been published. A run with no deliverable members is also refused rather than sent.

My audience synced but the platform shows far fewer people. Is something broken?

Almost certainly not. A platform matches only against people it already recognizes, and a low match rate produces no error anywhere. Check the delivered count in Ours Privacy and the match figure in the platform.

How long until I can target a synced audience?

A platform may take a day or two to process an update. Platforms also enforce minimum sizes: Meta's guidance is at least 1,000 people and Google recommends at least 5,000.

How do I stop a sync?

Remove the destination from the Sync to Destinations card. What is already on the platform stays until you remove it there.

I renamed the audience and cannot find it in the ad platform. Why?

The platform shows the Export Name, not your internal name. Copy the platform-facing name from the Sync to Destinations card.

Access and limits

How many audiences can I have?

Your plan sets a limit. Delete audiences you no longer use, or contact your account representative about raising it.

Who can create and publish audiences?

Viewing, creating, editing, previewing, publishing, deleting, and syncing can each be granted separately. Ask your account administrator.

Can I create audiences through the API?

Not today. See Platform API for what is available.

Next Steps

Audience concepts for the model behind these answers.
Recipes for worked configurations.
Compliance for audiences before sharing an audience.

Need help? Contact support@oursprivacy.com.