Promotions Tab

Site Search > Relevance > Relevance Modeling > Promotions Tab

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The Promotions Tab in SearchStax Site Search Solution helps you feature key content at the top of search results. Use it to promote content for seasonal events, high-impact keywords, or specific campaigns. This guide will walk you through setting up indexed and external promotions step-by-step, along with additional troubleshooting guidance based on user-reported issues.

How it Works

A promotion is triggered by a keyword or phrase that matches elements of the incoming query. The promoted item appears at the top of the search results list.

• An indexed promotion is a document from the local website index.
• An external promotion can be any webpage, identified by its URL.

See Promotions: Indexed vs. External for perspective on appropriate usage.

Creating Simple Promotions

The Promotions Tab of the SearchStax Site Search solution’s Model Details screen lets you “promote” an item to the top of the list of search results. Multiple results can be promoted and their order defined. 

1. Open the Promotions Tab
   • Navigate to Site Search > Relevance > Relevance Modeling > Promotions Tab
   • Click the Create New Promotion button.
2. Define Triggers
   • Add trigger phrases:
     • (Multiple triggers are ORd. Any of them can trigger the promotion.)
     • The Plus (+) button lets you add another trigger.
   • Set Matching Options:
     • Exact Match: Search query must exactly match the trigger.
     • Contains Match: Search query must contain the words from the trigger, but other words are allowed. Note: Matches whole words only, not substrings or regex patterns.
3. Select Promoted Items:
   1. Under Promotion Definition, select the Indexed Items tab.
   2. Enter a keyword or phrase in the “Default” search field to get matching results. (The “Advanced” search is described below on this page.)
   3. Matching result-items are displayed in the left column. Click up to ten items to select them for this promotion.
   4. Selected items appear in the right column. You can change the order of the selected items by using the Move Up and Move Down buttons.
4. Publish the Promotion: Click the Publish button at the bottom of the screen.

Advanced Search

Advanced Search helps when dealing with large indexes by targeting specific items directly.

Advanced Search uses Solr’s field:value syntax, such as url:“https://www.searchstax.com/docs/backups/”. In the example below, we used the Advanced Search to locate that specific document and then add it to the promotion.

Other examples of advanced searches:

• id:”ed55498c-1f34-395d-963f-c79e1679ffee”
• url:”https://www.searchstax.com/docs/searchstax-cloud-solr-backups/”
• year_published:2022

Using External Promotions

External promotions allow you to highlight content from outside your indexed data, such as events, partner pages, or advertisements.

1. Create an External Item:
   1. Open the External Items tab under Promotions.
   2. Click Create and enter:
      • Title
      • Description (optional)
      • URL. (Note that a URL may be used in only one promotion.)
2. Add the External Item to Results:
   1. Click the external item to move it to the Results List.
   2. Publish your changes to activate the external promotion.

Publishing Promotions

Promotions have two states:

• Draft: When you create or modify a promotion, use the Save Draft button to save the changes in an inactive state.
• Publish: The Publish button saves changes and makes the promotion active in the search experience.

The Promotions Tab lists all of the saved promotions. The orange status dots indicate draft promotions, and the green dots are published promotions.

The Publish button below this table converts all draft promotions to active published status.

Best Practices for Managing Promotions

• Use Descriptive Titles: Help organize and manage multiple promotions.
• Review Periodically: Keep promotions relevant by updating or disabling them as needed.

• Leverage Advanced Search: For large indexes, use precise field queries to quickly find the right content.

Troubleshooting Promotions

If you have any difficulty with Promotions, see Troubleshooting Promotions in the SearchStax Help Center.