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Ad Platforms ยท AppLovin

Last Updated: August 11, 2026

Catalog production

How Tierra builds and debugs the catalog (the end card, step 3): the two catalog types, feed fields, feed providers, per-type pixel events, image rules, and the tile-design framework. Read alongside the playbook for the platform model. Contribution splits, lift figures, tracking-parameter inheritance, and reporting gaps live in reporting and tracking.

The end card appears in every impression. It shows the catalog when one is configured, and branding when there isn't (see the playbook for the Brand Settings field list). The catalog attaches at the campaign level: one per campaign, so you can only A/B a catalog across separate campaigns, and a genuinely separate catalog need forces a separate campaign. It's safe to turn on mid-campaign, and it takes about 3 to 5 days to optimize.

End card behavior

Only the bottom 20 to 25% of the end card is the clickable CTA area, so keep the action-driving elements low in the frame. Gaming-style end cards can spike CTR without matching purchase intent, so read a high end-card CTR with that caveat and check it against CPP rather than clicks alone.

End-card sequences with multiple CTA buttons are worth testing as a strong pattern. On at least one account they've run about 50% above average ROAS, so treat this as recommended and testable, not guaranteed.

Pick the type first

AppLovin splits the catalog into two types (AppLovin's about dynamic catalog). Choose the type, then the method that populates it.

Product Catalog

Personalized product recommendations, for brands with roughly 5 or more products. It recommends products from your inventory and sends shoppers to specific product pages. AppLovin's docs cite a 10 to 25% conversion lift; Tierra sees about 10 to 15% in the field. Full spec: AppLovin's Dynamic Product Catalog doc.

Three methods populate it, all feeding the same Product Catalog:

  • Shopify sync: a direct sync through the Shopify app that auto-updates products, pricing, and availability. Preferred for Shopify clients. Not field-editable.
  • Pixel-inferred: auto-generated from pixel event data, and the default when nothing else is set (non-Shopify or headless Shopify). Not field-editable. It needs item_id and item_variant_id on both the purchase and view_item events, and image_url on view_item; item_category_id is recommended. Don't limit the pixel to specific pages, since a fuller pixel makes for a cleaner auto-generated catalog.
  • CSV / feed import: the only field-editable method (title, image, URL, availability, curation). Built for feed tools. Syncs once daily. Every value has to be populated correctly or the whole feed errors out. Curate to specific products through Item Sets.

Product URL rule: each product webUrl must have the pixel running and fire a view_item event.

Offering Catalog

Manual and advertiser-supplied, for accounts with fewer than about 5 products that want value-prop, service-tier, subscription, or benefit tiles instead of product-level personalization. No feed required. You build the offers row by row in the UI (Catalog Manager, Create New Catalog, Offering Catalog, Add Items), supplying your own images and landing-page URLs. It sends shoppers to predefined landing pages, not product pages. Full spec: AppLovin's Dynamic Offering Catalog doc.

Fields per item: ID (required, unique per offer); Image URL (required); Name (optional); Landing page URL (optional, defaults to the creative-set URL if blank).

Offering URL rule: landing pages must have the pixel implemented and fire a page_view event on load. Note the difference from Product URLs, which fire view_item. Don't generalize one to the other.

Layout guidance: an even number of offers, at least six items.

Single-product accounts

Always run a catalog, even with one product. Use an Offering Catalog of benefit tiles: one tile per pain point, benefit, or feature, with the same product and link repeated under different copy. Think of it like Google sitelinks. For a dog-supplement product, that's tiles for "itching," "hot spots," and "allergies," with a Brand Description prompt like "which of these issues is your dog dealing with?" All the tiles can point to the same link.

Image rules

  • Hosted-link only. You reference the image by URL; there's no file upload. Design the tile, host it on the client's Shopify store or CDN, and plug in the link.
  • JPG, JPEG, or PNG only. No .webp (support is a still-open feature request). If your source is .webp, you can still feed the item with matching item identifiers and get the dynamic catalog features, just without the image.
  • URL up to 2048 characters. File size and compression don't matter, since AppLovin compresses server-side.
  • No known pixel-dimension limits, since the image is just a hosted link, and the help docs omit any required aspect ratio too. The ideal is about 1x1.3, and anything from 1x1 to 1x1.5 works. Preview in the AppLovin mobile app to confirm how tiles present, since the desktop preview misrepresents tile size and spacing. Tiles are essentially mobile statics.

Feed fields (Product Catalog CSV/feed)

Required per AppLovin's docs: id (up to 64 characters), itemId (up to 64), name (up to 1024), description (up to 8192), categoryId (a Google product category ID), price, isAvailable, isBundle, primaryImageUrl (up to 2048), and webUrl. Add more images with additionalImageUrls (semicolon-separated).

Feed integrity rules, from AppLovin's docs:

  • No commas inside any field value, including name and description; commas are the CSV field delimiters. Separate array values like additional images with semicolons.
  • Escape any double quote inside a value with a backslash (\").
  • salePrice must never exceed price.
  • salePrice, salePriceStartDate, and salePriceEndDate are all optional (dates in ISO-8601). Setting salePrice doesn't make the dates mandatory; if both dates are left null, the sale price just isn't active.

Feed providers

Six supported (AppLovin's third-party feed integrations doc): DataFeedWatch, Feedonomics, Feedoptimise, Genus AI, GoDataFeed, and Marpipe. Feeds auto-sync catalog changes, availability, pricing, and creative designs. Short form:

  • DataFeedWatch: use the AppLovin channel template, and strip bad characters with Remove/Replace Values.
  • Feedonomics: managed. Contact support for a custom feed.
  • Feedoptimise: use the feed template and map Google Category IDs.
  • Genus AI: custom feed through support, or self-serve auto-sync.
  • GoDataFeed: search "Axon" in channels, then complete the mapping.
  • Marpipe: single treatment feed, set the format to Axon, then publish.

(AppLovin's docs point to a "Third-party catalog feeds" page for the current provider list but don't enumerate it inline, so treat this six as Tierra's working list.)

Brand Description field

A short tagline (about 75 characters), treated as ad copy. Supply 3 to 5 for a new client to test. Highlight offers and promos here. Put the evergreen offer (for example "40% off today") in the call-to-action button label rather than a generic "Shop Now."

Tile-design framework (6-tile flow)

Treat each tile as a micro-ad that communicates one idea in about a second. Recommended flow:

  1. Hero product (clean shot)
  2. Before/after proof
  3. Benefit icons
  4. Lifestyle use
  5. Technology or science highlight
  6. Offer / call-to-action push

Design rules: headlines of 3 to 5 words max, one message per tile, the product large (40 to 60% of the frame), high-contrast backgrounds, and a subtle glow for a premium feel. The story arc runs Product, Proof, Benefits, Usage, Tech, Buy.

Operational notes

  • Catalog banner production is a standing creative deliverable. Design them as statics (aim for about 1x1.3, anywhere from 1x1 to 1x1.5 works), then hand them to the client to host before wiring them up.
  • Catalog and retargeting scale depend on the pixel firing across the whole store, not just the funnel landing page. Full-store pixel coverage is a prerequisite before you lean on the catalog for scale.
  • Cleanup: disable junk products (like "shipping insurance") and remove off-brand or non-compliant products. Pixel-inferred catalogs can't be curated, so migrate to a CSV feed when you need to remove, rename, or curate products.
  • Refining the catalog to match the bundle landing pages you send traffic to improves performance.

Which type to pick

  • Roughly 5 or more products, product-level personalization, product detail pages: Product Catalog.
  • Fewer than about 5 products, value-prop or benefit tiles, predefined landing pages, single product: Offering Catalog.