Linking Catalog Items to Ads
A key benefit of using Kevel Catalog is the efficiency gained by using Catalog Item data to create batches of Ads. This process is made possible using Ad Templates and Creative Templates. These templates allow you to define a set mapping for specific types of Ads and placements depending on your use case. For example, you may want to use one attribute of a Catalog Item in a featured placement on your homepage and a different attribute on a search results page. You could create two different templates to accommodate these different placements. When creating ads that target these placements all you need to do is select the Catalog item that will populate your pre-defined template with the appropriate fields.
Ad Templates define a mapping between Catalog item attributes and Kevel Ad and Creative fields. It is possible to set any Ad and Creative attribute from product data including Creative Template fields.
Creative Templates define a fixed schema to store native ad data and ensure that Decision Requests always return a consistent format. Using Creative Templates also unlocks granular filtering of candidate ads with Kevel's AdQuery feature.
Managing Creative and Ad Templates
Creative Templates can be managed through the Creative Template API or through Kevel Studio.
At this time, Ad Templates are configured by Solutions Architects and Kevel Support.
Step 1: Define a Creative Template
The core of the Creative Template creation process is the same when making a template that will be used with Catalog items: give the template a name, description, and set of fields. Include a field for each facet you wish to filter on. For each filterable field, enable AdQuery.
AdQuery
AdQuery is a Decision API feature that filters which ads get selected based on properties of the ads. It provides fine-grained controls on the ad request side—think of AdQuery as querying over ads in a database and returning selections that match your query.
Step 2: Define an Ad Template
Once you have defined a Creative Template, you can work with your Kevel team to define an Ad Template. The central piece of an Ad Template is a set of mappings that correlate properties of Catalog items to Ad and Creative attributes.
Ad Template Properties
| Property | Description |
|---|---|
| Name | The name of the template. This is used by the Management UI to display a list of available templates in the Create Ads from Products workflow |
| Catalog | The Kevel Catalog that the template is compatible with |
| Ad Size | The Kevel Ad Size that will be set on Creatives created from the template |
| Creative Template ID | The ID of the Creative Template that will be used when creating Creatives from the template |
| Mappings | See table below |
Ad Template Mapping Properties
| Property | Description |
|---|---|
| Source | The Catalog item attribute key that is the data source for the mapping OR a fixed value if operation is constant |
| Target | The Ad or Creative (Template) field destination for the Source |
| Operation | One of literal (mapping value is evaluated from Catalog item data and copied exactly to the Target) or constant (Catalog item data is not referenced and Source is copied exactly to the Target) |
Propagating Catalog Item Updates to Ads
When you create an Ad derived from Catalog data (a product ad), Kevel stores a "provenance" record. This record contains the Ad ID, Catalog Item ID, and the Ad Template ID. When the source Catalog item changes, the Ad Template will be re-evaluated and the corresponding Ad data will be updated so that your Ads always have the latest version of the linked item's data.
For example, if the price of one of your products changes and you deliver an updated version of your product feed file to Kevel, all Ads linked to that product will show the updated price automatically.
Kevel can also automatically disable and re-enable ads from serving depending on the availability of each item in the Catalog. For this to be configured, Kevel needs each item in the Catalog to have a field representing the availability of the item, e.g. inStock: true/false. During the Catalog ingestion process, Kevel will determine if any Ads that utilize the associated Catalog data should be disabled or re-enabled. Alternatively, Kevel can map ad-activeness to the presence of an item in the Catalog so that if an item doesn’t appear in the next Catalog sync, any Ads associated with items that have been removed from the Catalog will be disabled (or deleted, depending on your desired configuration).
Updated over 1 year ago