CREATING YOUR OWN TEMPLATES

Contents

Templates define the creative look of an ad and what information will be used. A template has a defined size (e.g. 300×250 pixels) and typically includes text and image widgets.  

Adacado offers a variety of pre-built templates for different business types, ad sizes, and ad types for use in your campaigns. 

For users who want to design their own templates from scratch, this page provides instructions on how to create your own templates using Adacado’s powerful creative editor. Before moving on to the instruction, it is helpful to understand the types of template you can create with the creative editor and the widgets commonly used in templates.

Template Types

There are two types of templates that can be created with the creative editor.

Dynamic Templates

Dynamic templates can be used with an inventory data feed to dynamically pull values (e.g. product image, product title, price, product URL) from your inventory data feed to create hundreds or thousands of ad variations. Dynamic templates can also be used to create static ads without a data feed, either by using the template’s placeholder images and text as-is or replacing them with your own images and text.

Example Widgets:

• Product Image
• Product Title (or Product Description)
• Product Price (or Sale Price or Product Price + Sale Price)
• CTA Button
• Company Logo 

NOTE: 

• Image widget can be used to add a background image.
• Promotion Text can be added to dynamic templates.
• Navigation can be added if there is more than one template/product added to the ad.
• Always choose a border color that is not white or black in settings in the template header.

Adding Blank Templates to My Creative

To get started creating your own new templates, click on your username in the upper right corner of the platform header, then click “My Creative” in the dropdown.

You are now on the creative editor page where you can see a blank grid canvas, widget toolbox, and the “Select a creative to use” panel. On this page, you can create or edit a template, and to create a new template, you need to first open a new template on the canvas.

1. Choose the business type of your advertiser (e.g., retail, auto, real estate, or hotel).
2. Choose an ad format.
3. Click the “Create New” button to open a new template on the canvas and add the widgets to design the template.

Designing a New Template

Clicking on the “Create New” button will open a blank template of the selected ad format on the canvas and display the widget toolbox in the left navigation bar. You can now find image and text widgets that determine your ad content and add them to your template.

Widgets – Creative Elements

Widgets are individual creative elements that make up the content of the template/ad (e.g. Company Logo, CTA Button Text, Product Image, Product Title, etc.). To design your template, browse the various widgets available in the toolbox on the left navigation bar of the editor page, and drag the widgets you want from the toolbox to the template. After adding the widget to the template, you can adjust the size, style, color or alignment of the widget in the individual widget settings by selecting image or text from the template.

Adacado offers a wide variety of image and text widgets to choose from and gives you full control over which widget to use in your template. Click here to learn more about the different types of widgets and how to edit them.

Example: Creating a Static Template

Let’s create a static template with the widgets that do not require product data.

• Company Logo
• Promotion Text
• CTA Button

Edit Template Name

First, edit the template name by clicking the pencil icon in the template header.

Add Company Logo

First open the widgets toolbox by clicking on any area of the template, select the “Data Placeholders” widgets, then drag the “Company Logo” widget from the toolbox to the template. Upload your logo by dropping the file in the blue box in the pop-up.

Now the logo is added to the template and the widget setting for the “Company Logo” widget will open on the right, allowing you to change the image and edit the alignment. You can also adjust the size and position of the logo by adjusting the dashed box on the widget. Learn more about how to edit widgets here.

Add Promotion Text

Select the “Promotion Text” widget from the “Data Placeholders” and drag it to the template, then add your default promotion text to the widget settings, choose the font style (font type, size and color) and the text alignment options.

Add CTA Button

Drag the “CTA Button” widget to the template, adjust the size and position of the CTA button, and edit the color and alignment of the CTA button and CTA text in the widget settings. The “CTA Button” widget allows you to create only rectangular or square button, so if you want to create the button with a different shape, such as a circle, use the shape widget in the “Basic Elements” of the widgets toolbox, or use the “CTA Image Button” widget to upload your own CTA button image.

Save the Template

After adding all the widgets you need for your ad to the template, click the red save icon in the top left corner to save the template. After saving the template, click the “+” icon to open the “Select a creative to use” panel, then click the “My Templates” and find the template you saved. You can now add the template from “My Templates” to your campaign.

Edit Templates

To edit a template you have already created, select a template from the “My Templates” to open it on the canvas and add, remove or edit widgets from the template.

For example, to add a background image to a template, upload your own image using the “Image” widget in the “Basic Elements”, or select an image from the “Free-to-use Library” using the “Image Library” widget.

After adding the image to the template, edit the font color, etc. accordingly and save the changes. 

 You can now find the edited template in the “My Templates” section.

Learn more about editing widgets and templates here.

Example: Creating a Dynamic Template

Let’s create a dynamic template that contains widgets that are commonly used to display product data from an inventory data feed, along with a company logo and CTA Button.

• Company Logo
• Product Image
• Product Title (or Product Description)
• Product Price (or Sale Price or Product Price + Sale Price)
• CTA Button

Adding your company logo and CTA button follows the same steps as static ads.

Add Product Image

Select the “Product Image” widget from the “Data Placeholders”, drag it to the template and upload your own product image, or choose one from the “Free-to-use Image Library”. 

The image inserted in the “Product Image” widget in the template will be used as the default product image for the template you are working on. The default product image will be automatically replaced with an appropriate product image if your product data provides such data, and if product image data is missing, the default product image will be displayed in the ad.

The product image is now added to the template and widget settings of the product image will open on the right where you can replace the image and edit the alignment. You can also resize and reposition the image by adjusting the dashed box on the widget.

Add Product Title

Drag the “Product Title” widget from the toolbox to the template and add text you want to use as the default product title to the widget settings. Once the default product title is added, adjust the size, position, font style and alignment of the “Product Title” widget.

Add Product Price

Drag the “Product Price” widget to the template and add the default price value to the widget settings. If price data from the data feed is missing, you will see the default price value inserted in the template will be displayed in the ad.

After adding all the widgets to the template, save the template, then you can find it in “My Templates.”