To highlight certain search results or direct shoppers to a specific URL from the search engine results page (SERP), you use the Promotion tool from the Empathy Platform Playboard.

You configure a promotion to determine advertisement campaigns and promotional landing pages in your commerce store or help your shoppers discover specific products or product categories when searching.

You can define promotion banners and promoted results to customize search results and make them stand out on the SERP. Banners occupy the full width of the results grid, while promoted results occupy just one single cell of the results grid, like an organic search result.

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Don't you get the difference between promotion banners and promoted results? See the Promotions overview.

Getting started with the Promotion management tool

When you access the Promotion management tool in the Empathy Platform Playboard, you view the list of promotions that have been created for your commerce store. The list displays all turned on and off promotions, details on when the promotion was last modified, and options to search and filter the list. If no promotions have been created yet, the list does not contain any rows.

You can create, edit, delete, or even temporarily turn a promotion off without having to delete it. You can also schedule a promotion to appear in the results at a future date.

List view of the Promotion management tool - (A) Filters and search, (B) Action tools, (C) Promotions list, (D) Row selector, (E) Page navigation options.

The promotions list (C) displays the details of the configured promotions:

• Type: type of promotion configured (promotion banner or promoted result).
• Title: the identifying name for the configured promotion.
• Language: the language set up for your implementation.
• Filters: the values selected for one or several segments based on your implementation to customize different scenarios, if applicable.
• Queries: query or queries that shoppers must search for to display the configured promotion on the SERP.
• Image URL: URL of the image used to display on the SERP for the configured promotion.
• Scheduled: period set for running the promotion.
• Position: place where the banner (row) or the product promoted (position) is displayed in the results grid.
• Updated on: the date and time when the last change on the configuration was made.
• Status: the status of the configuration. It shows whether the promotion configuration is on or off.

Use the filters and search box (A) of the configuration list view to find the promotion configuration you need. When using the search box, you can search for strict matching results to get results that match exactly the query you entered. You can choose to have non-strict matching results, including either the configurations whose name matches exactly or partially your query terms.

In the bottom left corner of the screen, you can use the row selector (D) to select the number of promotions to be displayed in the list. If there is more than one page of promotion configurations, you can navigate to other pages in the promotions list using the page navigation options (E) in the bottom left corner of the screen.

To add a new configuration from the list screen, select the + NEW button. To edit an existing configuration, click its row and the edition screen will open. To edit or clone one configuration, or delete, turn on or off several configurations, select the checkbox next to the corresponding configurations and use the action tools (B) or the options displayed on the three-dot icon on the left.

Creating a Promotion configuration

You create a new promotion configuration from the promotion list screen. Click the + NEW button.

Edit view of the Promotion management tool - (A) Activation panel, (B) Filters, (C) Queries, (D) Promotion settings.

To create a new promotion configuration, follow the steps below:

1. Decide whether you want the promotion to be on and running for the search queries you set (A). Switch the toggle button if you want the promotion configuration to be off for now.

   note

   If you turn the promotion off, you can turn it on later on using the action tools in the promotion list screen.

2. Define the period for the promotion to be active: always active (default) or scheduled for a specific time range.

   note

   By default, promotions are set up to be always active. To schedule a promotion to run for a specific period, see Scheduling a promotion.

3. Select the filters (B) to determine the scenarios where the promotion is displayed (for example, desktop or mobile devices, specific divisions only, language, etc.). Filters are determined by your implementation.

4. Enter the search query or queries (C) for which you want to display the promotion in the Queries field. To include multiple queries, add search terms separated by semicolons (;) and press Enter. If you want to display the promotion for all searches, select the Match All Queries checkbox.

   No-result queries

   Research the search results that a query retrieves to formulate the queries for the promotion accordingly. Consider not setting up a promotion for queries that actually return no results.

5. Define the configuration options for the promotion in the Settings section (D). Depending on your implementation, you can define only promotion banners, promoted results, or both. When both promotion types can be configured, select the type of promotion you want to create:

   • Banner: to display a promotion banner. For example, a full-width image with a link, positioned by default at the top of the SERP.
   • Promoted: to display a promoted result. For example, an image with a link that appears within the results grid, as any other search result.

6. Indicate the location for the promotion to be displayed on the SERP. For promoted results, indicate the position in the results grid. For promotion banners, indicate the row to occupy in the grid. See Changing the location of a promotion for more details.

7. Indicate a name in the Title field to identify the promotion in the promotion list (optional).

8. Enter the URL to which the promotion will redirect (such as www.example.com/mothers-day).

   Using relative URLs

   If your organization is a multi-brand company, for example, it has several brands in its portfolio, Empathy Platform supports creating a single promotion to be featured in all commerce stores of the brands at a time. You can enter a relative URL for the promotion, skipping the domain details (like /mothers-day). Check with your Empathy representative if your implementation supports defining relative URLs.

9. Enter the URL of the image to be displayed on the SERP for the promotion. For best results on image rendering, see Image aspect ratios.

10. Click Save. If you have already turned on the promotion, it will be shown in the search results for the queries set in a matter of seconds.

Scheduling a promotion

Promotions can be set to be always active and running indefinitely. But you can schedule a configured promotion for a specific period (such as seasonal sales, special dates such as Valentine’s Day or Mother’s day).

To schedule a promotion:

1. Check the promotion you want to schedule in the promotion list screen.

2. Click the pencil icon to edit the selected promotion.

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   To schedule a new promotion, use the + NEW button on the promotion list screen. See the Creating a promotion section.

3. Turn the switch button on to activate the promotion.

4. Select the Scheduled option.

5. Enter the range of dates and times for the promotion in the Active from and Active to fields.

6. Click Save.

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   If you do not enter an end date, the promotion will be always active and appear in the search results.

Turning off a promotion configuration

You can configure a promotion configuration and turn it off temporarily, without having to delete it, so that you can reuse it on future occasions.

To turn an existing promotion off:

1. Select the checkbox the promotion you want to turn off in the promotion list screen.

2. Select the Turn off option in the actions tool menu to deactivate the selected configuration. A confirmation message appears at the button of the sreen.

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You can turn off an existing promotion using the toggle button on the Edit promotion screen. Use the pencil icon on the Promotion list screen to start editing the configuration. You can directly create a turned off configuration. See the Creating a promotion section.

Changing the location of a promotion

By default, promotion banners appear on top of the results grid, occupying an entire row, and promoted results appear in the first position of the results grid. However, both banners and promoted results can be displayed in multiple locations within the results grid, especially when multiple promotions are displayed at the same time.

To change the location of an existing promotion:

1. Check the promotion you want to relocate in the promotion list screen.

2. Click the pencil icon to edit the existing promotion.

3. Define the position for the promotion in the Settings section from the Edit promotion view:

   • Promotion banners: use the Show banner in row selector to indicate the row of the grid in which the banner will be displayed.
   • Promoted results: use the Show Promoted position selector to indicate the cell in the results grid in which the promoted result will be displayed.

4. Click Save.

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Best practices: Image aspect ratios

The image aspect ratio for a promotion may vary depending on the screen size. However, the image aspect ratio is calculated by dividing the width by the height of the image visible on the screen and is usually expressed as Y:Z. In short, the calculation of the ratio of 1:X is X=Y/Z.

Promotion banners are displayed at 100% width across the results grid. There is no default height for banners. Use the height of the image to determine the correct ratio.

The images for promoted results are displayed at 100% width in the results grid cell. The aspect ratio for a promoted result should be identical to that used for the entire product card.