Mistake: test conversions left in live reports

Mistake: test conversions left in live reports

Failure mode: during setup you fire test postbacks. You forget to flag or remove them, and they sit in your live data inflating early ROI on a fresh campaign — the exact moment you are deciding whether to scale.

Fix — 4 steps:
— Always fire test postbacks with a reserved test clickid or a test=1 parameter you can filter and delete later.
— Keep a setup log: every test conversion gets a timestamp and the id used, so cleanup is mechanical, not from memory.
— After QA passes, delete or quarantine all test rows before sending a single dollar of real traffic.
— Never test by clicking your own live link from your own device — your own conversions then count as real.
— For ongoing QA, use the network's sandbox or a dedicated test offer that never touches production reports.

Verify: filter the campaign for your test marker. The result must be zero rows before launch.

Save this SOP. Run this before every launch.