Subsections


A..15 Advertising

The Advertising Admin Tool is where you manage all advertisements, including creating new ad types and approving ads submitted (bought) by the users.

There are six parts to the Advertising Admin Tool; by default it shows you the ad judging page, since once ads are set up that will be the most-used page.

All six pages have links to the other five at the top of the page.

The six parts are described below.

A..15.1 Judge Submissions

The Judge Submissions page is where you approve or disapprove of individual ads purchased by your users. If there are no ads waiting to be approved, the message ``No ads recently submitted'' appears. You can control whether or not you see only paid ads or both paid and unpaid ads on this page using the variable ads_judge_unpaid.

If there are ads waiting for approval, they are shown in a two-column table.

The left-hand column shows the ad, as it would appear once it is approved.

The right-hand column contains the information about the ad, and controls for approving or disapproving the ad. The information displayed is the sponsor, or user who purchased the ad, and the number of impressions purchased and their cost.

To approve the ad, select ``Approve'' from the drop-down box; to disapprove, select ``Disapprove'', and to postpone the decision leave it at ``Choose Action''. If desired, an approval or disapproval message can be entered into the text box labelled ``Message''; this will be sent to the sponsor when you approve or disapprove the ad.

A..15.2 Ad Listing

The Ad Listing page displays all ads in the system and their status in a table. Just above the table is a summary of the number of active ads and impressions currently in the system.

The ad list is a table with five columns and a row for each ad.

The first column is the title of the ad, taken from the text entered in the title field when the ad was created. It links to a preview of the ad.

The second column is the nickname of the ad's sponsor. It links to the sponsor's ad list page.

The third column is the ad's status. Possible status entries are: Unjudged, Approved, Completed, Disapproved, Active, and Inactive.

The fourth column contains an edit link for each ad. See appendix A.15.4 for a description of the ad edit form.

The fifth column contains the number of impressions remaining before the ad is removed from the normal rotation. Example ads are indicated in this column with ``(example)'' instead of a number.

A..15.3 Template Listing

The Template Listing page displays all templates present in the system and provides links to edit them and the examples associated with them.

The template list is a table with five columns and a row for each template.

The first column is the name of the template.

The second column has a link to edit the template itself, which is a block of the same name as the template name in the first column. See section 4.14 for details on what special blocks can be used within the templates.

The third column has a link to edit the example ad that is used to show prospective advertisers what that ad type will look like. See appendix A.15.5 for a description of the example ad edit form.

The fourth column has a link to preview the example ad, if one exists.

The fifth column is the number of ads created using each template. The example ads count towards this number, so each template should have at least one in this column, unless the template has just been created and the example ad hasn't yet.


A..15.4 New Advertisement

The New Advertisement page displays the ad edit form, blank so you can create a new ad. When editing an existing ad, the form is filled in with that ad's current values.

The fields, from the top down, have the following effects:

Ad Template
New Advertisements must be assigned a template, so Scoop knows how to display them, and also which fields to ask for. Only Ad Templates which have example ads will be available in this list.
Active
Whether or not an ad is active and displayed. For the ad to be active, it must also have been judged and approved, first.
Judged
Whether or not an admin has made a decision about whether or not to approve the ad. This must be checked for the Active checkbox above to take effect.
Approved
Whether or not an admin has approved the ad. If this checkbox is not checked, and the Judged checkbox is, the ad has been judged and disapproved. This must be checked for the Active checkbox above to take effect.
Perpetual
Whether or not the ad will ever run out of impressions. Perpetual ads are most useful for filler ads when the number of real ads gets low, or for when you aren't selling ads but just want some perpetually rotating links to display using the ad system.
Paid for
Whether or not the sponsor has paid for his ad. If the payment processing is set up properly, it can automatically set this value when a user pays via credit card or paypal; if the sponsor sends a cheque or money order as payment, this is how you would mark the ad as paid.
Views Left
How many counted impressions are left before this ad stops showing. If the ad is Perpetual (see above) then this is best left at zero.


A..15.5 Edit Example Ad

The Edit Example Ad page allows you to create or edit an example ad for each template. Example ads are required before an ad template can be activated and real ads can be created using it.

When first loaded, this page only shows a drop-down box with all ad templates listed. You must select the ad template you wish to work with and press ``Get''; Scoop will then build the appropriate form. Each ad template may or may not have a given field, so Scoop cannot draw the form until it knows what template to use.

Once you have fetched the form for an ad template, you can fill in the fields available.

Below the form is a link to edit the ad template itself, and the HTML of the ad template is displayed just below that.

A..15.6 Edit Ad Properties

The Edit Ad Properties page allows you to set up an ad template, including how much it costs, what the maximum number of characters in a given field is, and so on.

When first loaded, this page only shows a drop-down box with all ad templates listed. You must select the ad template you wish to work with and press ``Get''; Scoop will then build the appropriate form. Each ad template may or may not have a given field, so Scoop cannot draw the form until it knows what template to use.

Once you have fetched the form, the following fields appear:

Activate this ad type
Allows users to create and purchase ads of this type. If there is no example ad for this ad template, Scoop will not allow you to activate the ad type.
Allow Ad Discussions
Sets whether or not the ad can be displayed in a special ad section, where users can comment on the ad. If on, the sponsor can choose whether to leave it on or turn it off; if off, the sponsor has no choice, it is always off.
Ad Type Name
A display name for this ad template.
CPM
The cost per 1000 impressions. See section 4.14 for how Scoop counts impressions.
Minimum Purchase Size
The minimum number of impressions a user must purchase to get this ad.
Maximum Purchase Size
The maximum number of impressions a user may purchase.
Ad Position (integer)
A number corresponding to an ad location. Ad locations are passed as a parameter to the show_ad box (|BOX,ad_box,|). If the number is not given, ``1'' is assumed. You can use this parameter to set up different types of ads in different locations. Any number of ad types can share an ad position; they are rotated in the same queue. Any number of physical locations in the page can also share an ad position; they pull their ad text from the same queue. A given ad type cannot be shared across different ad positions, however.
Maximum number of characters to allow in the <field> field of this ad type
Depending on which fields you have placed in the ad template, there could be a number of these lines. Enter the number of characters you would like to allow for each field.
Short Description
This is shown next to the ad's display name and a preview of the example ad when a potential advertiser is deciding which ad type to buy. It should be plain text and no more than 255 characters long.
Submit Instructions
This is shown when the advertiser has selected the ad type and is filling in his ad. There is no length limit and HTML may be used.


janra
2004-03-26