Step 1: Settings
Naming your Line Item
The first step in creating a line item is to give it a name. The name you choose will only be visible to you on the Campaigns page and in Analytics. It will not appear in your ads and will never be visible to shoppers.
Choose a name that helps you easily identify the line item within your campaign or in reports. Line item names must be unique within a campaign—each line item must have a different name.
Selecting a Retailer
After naming the line item, select the Retailer where you want your ads to run.
Click the dropdown menu to choose from the available retailers. You can select only one retailer per line item.
The list of products available for promotion (explained later in this guide) will automatically update based on the selected retailer.
Bid Strategy
In this step, you’ll choose your preferred bidding strategy. We offer Standard or Adaptive CPC optimization. Your choice in this step will impact what fields you see in Step 4: Bid
Setting Start and End Dates
Begin by selecting a Start Date from the calendar. Today's date is selected by default, but you may choose any future date.
Next, choose an End Date. You have two options:
No End Date (None): Your line item will be on Active status for as long as it has funds to spend.
Specific End Date: Select a date from the calendar. The line item will automatically stop serving ads and switch to Ended status at the end of that day.
Ad Scheduling
How to set up an Ad Schedule?
Click the Ad Schedule option under the Schedule heading in Step 1 of the line item creation process.
Select Run Ads on a schedule to reveal a set of three dropdowns:
Day(s) of the week
Start Time
End Time
To create a schedule for your Onsite Sponsored Products Line Item:
Choose a day of the week or use the Weekday (Monday–Friday) or Weekend (Saturday–Sunday) presets.
Set your desired Start Time, from 12:00 a.m. to End of Day (11:59 p.m.).
Set your desired End Time, from 12:00 a.m. to End of Day (11:59 p.m.).
Click Add to build out your schedule. You can create multiple time blocks for a single day (intraday parameters). For example, for Monday, you might schedule ads to run:
7:00–9:00 a.m.
12:00–2:00 p.m.
5:00 p.m.–End of Day
Ensure that you’ve selected an end time after your start time. If you set conflicting rules – for example, Monday: 9:00 a.m.-10:00 p.m., Tuesday: 6:00 a.m.-4:00 p.m., Weekdays (Monday-Friday): 7:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m., then the system will take the earliest start time available to each period and the latest possible end time:
Monday: 7:00 a.m.-10:00 p.m.
Tuesday: 6:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m.
Wednesday, Thursday, Friday: 7:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m.
Click the x button to the right of each individual rule to remove it. To reset the schedule entirely, click Run Ads all the time.
For more information on Ad Scheduling, check out the dedicated article here Ad Schedule.
Budget, Caps and Pacing
Setting a Line Item Budget
After creating your line item, you can choose one of two budget options:
Uncapped Budget: Select Uncapped, and your line item will spend freely from the funds available at the campaign level. The available funds are determined by the campaign budget that can be capped or uncapped. Your line item will stop spending once the Campaign budget is reached. At this point, your line item status will switch to Budget Hit.
Capped Budget: Select Capped and enter the maximum amount for your line item to spend. Your line item might not spend the entire amount. The amount is used as a cap, and your line item will stop spending when it is reached.
Setting a Line Item Pacing
After selecting a budget, you can optionally set pacing rules to control the rate at which the budget is spent. By default, no pacing is applied, and the line item will spend as quickly as possible. You can select one or a combination of the following options:
You can optionally set line item pacing to determine how a line item spends its capped or uncapped budget. Regardless of whether a pace is set, a line item will never spend more than its set budget or campaign budget. You can set a Daily and/or Monthly Pace or an Automated Pace per line item.
Daily Pace: Your line item won't spend more than the daily pace amount.
Monthly Pace: Your line item costs will not exceed the monthly pace amount for each calendar month. If your line item doesn't start on the first day of the calendar month or if you update pacing throughout the month, the monthly pace will be calculated based on the remaining days in the current calendar month.
Automated Pace: Your daily spend will be adjusted automatically. You must have a line item budget and an end date, or enter a monthly pace to select this option.
This option is helpful if the line item does not reach its daily spend every day, but you want to make sure it has the opportunity to spend the full budget.
You can combine a Daily and Monthly pace on a line item, but you can't combine a Daily and Automated pace on a line item. Set a Daily and/or Monthly Pace.
How to set a Daily/Monthly Pace?
On the Campaigns page, click the name of the campaign that contains the line item you want to edit.
On the Line Items page, click the Edit icon in the Daily Pace and/or Monthly Pace column and enter the amount you want to allot per day/month.
Click Save.
How to set an Automated Pace?
On the Campaigns page, click the name of the campaign that contains the line item you want to edit.
On the Line Items page, click the name of the line item you want to edit.
On the Line Item Settings step, ensure that an End Date is set (in the Schedule section) and the Line Item Budget is capped (in the Line Item Budget section) or that a Monthly pace is set (in the Monthly Cap section).
Scroll to the Daily Cap section and mark the Automated checkbox.
Click Save & Exit.
Daily Cap Overrides
Commerce Max supports two monthly and three daily (automated, fixed, none) pacing options, which apply to the line item’s entire flight and consider the line item’s total budget.
The Daily Cap Override is an additional daily cap that is optional. Users can use a Daily Cap Override to set a distinct budget cap for a specific day or period within the line item’s flight.
With a Daily Cap Override, you can schedule spend in advance and control exactly when and how much a line item can spend up to.
How does a Daily Cap Override work?
Setting a Daily Cap Override is optional. Whenever it is relevant, the budget cap specified by the Daily Cap Override will supersede the budget cap set by the Daily Pace setting.
During non-applicable days, pacing will be determined by the Daily Pace amount.
How to create or edit a Daily Cap Override?
To create or edit a Daily Cap Override,
Find the line item for which you want to create or view a Daily Cap Override.
Click on the edit icon in the Daily Budget column.
A pop-up should appear, showing the daily pacing settings.
Click on Manage on the bottom right and access the Daily Cap Override tool. In this tool, you can see and edit the existing active or upcoming Daily Cap Overrides, as well as create new ones.
Click on the Add button. A new row will be added to the table where you can specify the start and end dates and the daily cap value.
To edit, click the pencil edit icon, modify the settings.
Click on the Tick icon to save it. Your new cap is ready and visible on the table.
You can create multiple overrides; however, they all have to be on different dates.
Monthly Cap Overrides
Commerce Max supports two monthly and three daily (automated, fixed, none) pacing options, which apply to the line item’s entire flight and consider the line item’s total budget.
The Monthly Cap Override is an additional monthly cap that is optional. Monthly Cap Overrides can be used to adjust the budget of a single month without removing the Monthly Cap from the whole flight. Pacing will adjust for the month with the Monthly Cap Override to the new set amount.
With a Monthly Cap Override, you can schedule monthly budget caps in advance and control exactly how much a line item can deliver up to each month.
How does a Monthly Cap Override work?
A Monthly Cap Override will be respected over the default monthly cap option (Fixed, None) when applicable. During non-applicable months, the budget cap specified by the Monthly Pace setting will be used.
Monthly Cap Overrides are also used to calculate the daily needed spend for the Automated pacing option.
How to create or edit a Monthly Cap Override?
To create or edit a Monthly Cap Override:
Find the line item for which you want to create or view a Monthly Cap Override.
Click the edit icon in the Monthly Budget column.
A pop-up should appear, showing the monthly pacing settings.
Click Manage on the bottom right and access the Monthly Cap Override tool. In this tool, you can see and edit the existing active or upcoming Monthly Cap Overrides, as well as create new ones.
To create a new Monthly Cap Override, click on the Add button. A new row will be added to the table where you can select the month and enter the monthly cap value.
To edit a Monthly Cap Override, click the pencil edit icon on the existing override and modify the settings.
Click the tick icon to save it. Your new cap is ready and is visible on the table.