Content Widgets

From Wiki

What is a Content Widget?

Content widgets are a linking method that enable you to populate websites and emails with links to products. The products in the content widget can be controlled by you by selecting items from a merchant/s product feed/s.

Types of Content Widgets

Using Content Widgets, there are two main options that a partner may choose from:

• Self Serve Widgets
• Managed Widgets

Self Serve Widgets

The Self Serve solution means that you can select exactly which products you want to be displayed within the template that you have chosen. You have full control over the widgets content. More information regarding this option can be found in the Creating and Populating Content Widgets document.

Managed Widgets

Managed Widgets are widgets that contain products which are carefully selected and managed by ShopWindow. In layman’s terms, this solution lets you integrate a widget which has products within it that are constantly updated by ShopWindow, in line with trends in the market place or seasonality.

An example of this is the following Games widget (image taken in Fall 2008). A gaming website can integrate this top ten games chart within their website, and it will be updated regularly by ShopWindow. The benefits of this are that no management is required by you, all products are selected and customized to ensure optimum performance.

Templates

There are a vast number of templates available for widgets and a brief synopsis of each is explained below:

• Standard - these offer full customisation options where you can colour aspects of the template to seamlessly integrate into your site
• MyBranded - these are widgets that you make and submit to ShopWindow to be created and so cannot be customised within the interface (only the products can be edited)
• MerchantBranded - these are widgets that have been made by a specific Merchant for promotion solely of their products meaning that the widgets appearance are locked and the contents is restricted to that merchants products only
• Themed Widgets - these are created by the design guys in house and are used to promote seasonality (Christmas, Valentines etc) as well as other opportunities. The appearance cannot be edit but any products may be used
• Gift Finder - here you will find the Gift Finder widgets, for more information on this please see here

For more information about creating widgets please see this article: Creating and Populating Content Widgets.