Incorporating advertisements (ads) in your messages is a great way to develop your organization's business relationships.

There are three steps to adding advertisements to messages and each step is done in a different area of Higher Logic Thrive Marketing Professional (Thrive Marketing Professional).

1. Create an image-based ad (in Messages > Advertisements);
2. Configure a template for advertisements (in Messages > Templates); and
3. Insert an image-based ad in a new or existing message (in Messages > List).

Before you begin...

Review the information in this section before you create an image-based ad and insert it in a template or message.

Requirements

• Make sure the image is a GIF, PNG, or JPG file type.
• Make sure the image does not exceed 90KB.
• Make sure the image name does not contain any spaces or special characters.

Recommendations

• Ensure your image's dimensions are appropriate for the location in your template. For example, if you plan to display the ad in a right sidebar that has a fixed width of 100 pixels, don't use an image wider than 100 pixels.
• Determine whether your image already has padding incorporated into its design or if padding should be added to the template's/message's HTML.
• Test the URL that you want the image to link to when clicked.

Step 1 - Create an image-based ad

To create an image-based ad:

1. Navigate to Messages > Advertisements.
2. Click Create at the top of the Advertising page.
3. In the Add Advertising dialog:

• Specify a name for the ad (required).
• Select a folder to store the ad (required).
• Click Upload to browse to and select the image file (required). The button label then updates to Change.
• Specify the image's target URL in the Link field (required).
• Specify text that describes the ad in the Text field. (This will be used in the Text version of the message.)
• Set the status to Active.

4. Click Save.

Step 2 - Configure a template for advertisements

After creating an ad, you have to configure a template with an Advertisement content block. This can then be populated with an advertisement when a message is created, based on this template.

NOTE: In order to add an advertisement to a message, the message must be based on a template that has been configured with an Advertisement content block.

To configure a template for advertisements:

1. Navigate to Messages > Templates.
2. Edit an existing template (select template and click Edit) or create a template (click the plus sign to the right of the page title).
3. On the Design tab of the Designer, click the Build sub-tab and then click to expand the Structure section.
4. Click and drag a Message Content block from the left palette to the Designer "canvas."

5. Click to select the Message Content block (the left palette updates to Advertisement Properties).
6. Change Content Type to Advertisement and, optionally, select a number of advertisements from the dropdown.

7. Save the template.

Step 3 - Insert an image-based ad in a message

You can insert your image-based ad in a message so that when your subscribers click the image, the linked web page automatically opens in a new browser tab.

TIP: Each click of the ad is recorded in Thrive Marketing Professional and click metrics are available in Advertisements Reports.

To insert an ad in a message:

1. Navigate to the message in which you want to insert the ad.
2. Click the Add Advertisement content area and choose your ad from the list that appears.

Your imaged-based ad displays in the message.

3. Save the message.
4. Configure the message properties, etc. on the Options tab.
5. On the Review & Send tab:

• Preview the Desktop, Mobile, and Online versions of the message; in each, click the ad to verify that it opens the link in a new tab.
• Review the Text Version of the message.
• Run any applicable tests.
• Send a test version of the message to yourself for review and testing. (Recommended)
• Send a copy of the message to others for review. (Recommended)
• Schedule and send the message.

Related articles

If you are including advertisements in your messages, it's a good idea to review how those ads are being received. Thrive Marketing Professional has several reports that are dedicated to the "performance" of advertisements in your messages; see Advertisements Reports.