Carousel banners enable marketers to drive conversion by easily creating interactive rotating promotional content and delivering it to any screen.
Creating and modifying content featured in promotional banners can be time-consuming, limiting your ability to quickly publish new content or make it more targeted. Carousel Banners enable you to quickly create or modify rotating banners, add interactivity such as hotspots linking to product detail or related resources, and deliver them to any screen – letting you bring new promotional content to market faster.
Carousel Banners are designated by a banner with the word CAROUSELSET:
On your website, a carousel banner can look as follows:
Here you can navigate through the images (by clicking on the numbers). In addition, the slides automatically rotate based on a time interval you can customize. Images that you add in the carousel banner support both hotspots and image maps, where users can either tap or to go to a hyperlink or access a Quickview window.
In this example, a user has tapped or clicked an image map and accessed the Quickview window for gloves:
Watch a 10 minute and 33 second walkthrough on how carousel banners are created. You will also learn how to preview, edit, and deliver carousel banners.
Non-administrative users must be added to the dam-users group in order to be able to create or edit carousel banners. If you are having trouble creating or editing, please see your system administrator who can add you to the dam-users group.
To get you up and running quickly:
Identify hotspot and image map variables (only for customers using AEM Assets + Dynamic Media)
Start by identifying dynamic variables used by the existing Quickview implementation so that you can enter hotspots and image map data properly during the carousel banner creation process in AEM Assets.
If you are an AEM Sites or Ecommerce customer, you can use the built-in feature to navigate to product pages and lookup the existing skus in the product catalog. You do not need to manually enter hotspot or image map variables. See information on setting up eCommerce.
If you are an AEM Assets and Dynamic Media customer, you will manually enter data for hotspots and image maps, and then integrate the published URL or Embed code with your third-party content management system.
Optional: Create a Carousel Set viewer preset, as needed.
If you are an administrator, you can customize the behavior and appearance of the carousel by creating your own Carousel viewer preset. The main benefit is that you can re-use this custom viewer preset for multiple carousels. However, users also have the option to customize the behavior and appearance of the carousel directly while authoring the carousel. This is the preferred approach when you want a very specific design for a given carousel.
Upload image banners that you want to make interactive.
In Carousels Sets, users navigate through banner images and tap hotspots or image maps to access relevant content.
To create a Carousel Set in Assets, tap Create, then select Carousel Sets. Add assets to slides and tap Save. You can also edit the appearance and behavior of the carousel directly within the editor.
Add hotspots or image maps to an image banner.
Add one or more hotspots or image maps to an image banner and associate each one with an action such as a link, a Quickview, or an Experience Fragment. After you add hotspots or image maps, you finish this task by publishing the carousel set. Publishing creates the embed code that you can use to copy and apply to your website landing page.
See (Optional) Previewing Carousel Banners - Optional. If desired, you can view a representation of your carousel set and test its interactivity.
You publish a Carousel Set as you would any asset. In Assets, navigate to the Carousel Set and select it and tap or tap Publish. Publishing a Carousel Set activates the URL and Embed string.
Do one of the following:
Add a carousel banner to your website page You can add the carousel banner URL or embed code you have copied onto the website page.
Add a carousel banner to your website in AEM If you are an AEM Sites customer you can add the carousel set directly to the page in AEM, using the Interactive Media component.
If you need to edit Carousel Sets, see editing Carousel Sets. In addition, you can view and edit Carousel Set properties.
Start by identifying dynamic variables used by the existing Quickview implementation so that you can enter hotspots or image map data properly during the carousel set creation process in AEM Assets.
When you add hotspots or image maps to a banner image in AEM Assets you need to assign a SKU and optional additional variables to each hotspot or image map. Such variables are used later to match hotspots or image maps with Quickview content.
If you are an AEM Sites and/or AEM Ecommerce customer, skip this step. You do not need to manually identify hotspot or image map variables; you can use the integration with Ecommerce for product integration. See information on setting up eCommerce. In addition, you can use the Interactive component and add it to your web page.
If you are an AEM Assets or Media customer, you publish the URL or Embed code and then integrate with your third-party content management system and identify hotspots and image maps manually.
It is important to properly identify the number and type of variables to associate with hotspot or image map data. Each hotspot or image map added to a banner image must carry enough information to unambiguously identify the product in the existing backend system. At the same time, each hotspot or image map should not include more data than is necessary. The reason is because that would make the data entry process overly complex and on-going hotspot or image map management more error-prone.
There are different ways to identify a set of variables to use for hotspot or image map data.
Sometimes it may be enough to consult with IT specialists responsible for the existing Quickview implementation, as they are likely to know what is the minimum set of data needed to identify Quickview in the system. However, in most cases it is also possible to simply analyze the existing behavior of the front-end code.
The majority of Quickview implementations use the following paradigm:
The approach then is to visit different areas of the existing website where the Quickview feature is implemented, trigger the Quickview and capture the Ajax URL sent by web page for loading the Quickview data or content.
Normally there is no need for you to use any specialized debugging tools. Modern web browsers feature web inspectors that do an adequate job. The following are a few examples of web browsers that include web inspectors:
When network monitoring is turned on in the browser, trigger the Quickview on the page.
Now find the Quickview Ajax URL in the network log and copy the recorded URL for future analysis. In most cases when you trigger the Quickview there are numerous requests that are sent out to the server. Typically, the Quickview Ajax URL is one of the first in the list. It has either a complex query string portion or path, and its response MIME type is either text/html
, text/xml
, or text/javascript
.
During this process it is important to visit different areas of your website, with different product categories and types. The reason is that Quickview URLs may have parts that are common for a given website category, but change only if you visit a different area of the website.
In the simplest case, the only variable part in the Quickview URL is the product SKU. In this case, the SKU value is the only data piece that you need for adding hotspots or image maps to the banner image.
However, in complex cases, the Quickview URL has different varying elements in addition to the SKU, such as category ID, color code, size code, and so forth. In such cases, every element is a separate variable in your hotspot or image map data definition in the carousel banner feature.
Consider the following examples of Quickview URLs and their resulting hotspot or image map variables:
Single SKU, found in the query string. | The recorded Quickview URLs include the following:
The only variable part in the URL is the value of the |
Single SKU, found in the URL path. | The recorded Quickview URLs include the following:
The variable part is in the last portion of the path, and it becomes the SKU value of the hotspots/image maps: |
SKU and category ID in the query string. | The recorded Quickview URLs include the following:
In this case, there are two varying parts in the URL. The SKU is stored in the As such, the hotspot/image map definitions are pairs. That is, a SKU value and an additional variable called
|
If you have already uploaded the images that you want to use, advance to the next step, Creating Carousel Sets. Please note the images used in the carousel must be uploaded after Dynamic Media has been enabled.
To upload image banners, see Uploading assets.
Non-administrative users must be added to the dam-users group to be able to create or edit carousel banners. If you are having trouble creating or editing, please see your system administrator who can add you to the dam-users group.
To create a Carousel Set:
In Assets, navigate to the folder where you want to create the Carousel Set and tap Create > Carousel Set.
On the Carousel Banner Editor page, tap Tap to open Asset Selector to select the image for your first slide.
On the Carousel Banner Editor page, do either one of the following:
Tap to select assets that you want to include in your Carousel Set. Selected assets have a checkmark icon over them. When you are finished, near the upper-right corner of the page, tap Select.
With the Asset Selector, you can search for assets by typing in a keyword and tapping Return. You can also apply filters to refine your search results. You can filter by path, collection, file type, and tag. Select the filter and then tap the Filter icon on the toolbar. Change the view by tapping the View icon and selecting Column View, Card View, or List View.
See Working with Selectors for more information.
Continue to add slides until you have added all the images that you want to rotate through in the Carousel Set.
(Optional) Do any of the following:
To delete a slide, tap the slide, and tap Delete Slide in the toolbar. To move a slide, tap the reoreder icon and hold and move to the desired location.
After you have added the images in slides, you can add a hotspot, image map, or both to your image. See adding hotspots or image maps.
You can change the visual design and behavior of carousel sets by tapping or clicking the Behavior and Appearance tabs and making adjustments to how your carousel banner looks or how specific components behave. See managing viewer presets for more information on how to use the viewer editor.
For carousel banners, the following may be things you want to adjust:
You can also preview what the carousel banner will look like. See (Optional) Previewing Carousel Banners.
Tap Save when finished.
You can add hotspots or image maps to a banner using the Carousel Set editor.
When you add hotspots or image maps, you can define them as a Quickview pop-up display, as a hyperlink, or an Experience Fragment.
See Experience Fragments.
Be aware that the social media sharing tools in Carousel Banner are not supported when you embed the viewer in an Experience Fragment. To work around this, you can use or create viewer presets that do not have social media sharing tools. Such viewer presets let you successfully embed it in Experience Fragments.
As you add hotspots or image maps to an image, remember to save your work. Undo and Redo options, near the upper-right corner of the page, are supported during your current creation/editing session.
When you finish creating your carousel banner, you can optionally use Preview to see a representation of how your carousel banner will appear to customers.
See (Optional) Previewing Carousel Banners.
When you add hotspots to an image in an Interactive Image or a Carousel Banner, the hotspot information is stored in the same metadata location - relative to the image’s location–regardless of whether it is an Interactive Image or a Carousel Banner. This functionality means that you can easily re-use the same image - along with its defined hotspot data - in either viewer.
Be aware, however, that Carousel Banners support image maps on images that can also contain hotspots; an Interactive Image does not. Keep this in mind if you intend to create an Interactive Image or Carousel Banner that uses the same image. You may want to create Interactive Images and Carousel Banners using separate copies of the same image instead.
If you are editing interactive images with hotspots and crop the image, your hotspots are removed.
To add hotspots to an image banner:
From Assets, navigate to the carousel set you want to make interactive.
Select the carousel set and tap Edit.
In the Carousel Viewer Editor, select the slide you want to make interactive.
Near the upper-left corner of the page, tap Hotspot or Image Map.
Do either of the following:
If necessary, drag the hotspot or the image map to a new location. Add additional hotspots or image maps as necessary.
To delete a hotspot or image map, tap the Actions tab. Under the Maps & Hotspots heading, from the Selected Type drop-down menu, select the name of the hotspot or image map you want to remove. Tap the Trash icon next to the menu, then tap Delete.
In the Name text field, type the name of the hotspot or the image map. This name also appears in the Maps & Hotspot drop-down list. Providing a name makes it easy to identify the hotspot or image map if you decide to make changes to it in the future.
Do one of the following in the Actions tab:
Tap Quickview.
If you are an AEM Sites and Ecommerce customer, tap the Product Picker icon (magnifying glass) to open the Select Product page. Tap the product you want to use, then tap the check mark in the upper-right corner of the page to return to the Carousel Banner Editor.
If you are not an AEM Sites or Ecommerce customer
category=Mens
is an added variable.Tap Hyperlink.
If you are an AEM Sites customer, tap the Site Selector icon (folder) to navigate to a URL.
The URL-based method of linking is not possible if your interactive content has links with relative URLs, particularly links to AEM Sites pages.
If you are a standalone customer, in the HREF text field, specify the full URL path to a linked web page.
Be sure you specify whether to open the link in a new browser tab (recommended default) or the same tab.
See Working with Selectors for more information.
Tap Experience Fragment.
If you are an AEM Sites customer, tap the Search icon (magnifying glass) to open the Experience Fragment page. Tap the Experience Fragment you want to use, then tap Select in the upper-right corner of the page to return to the Hotspot management page.
See Experience Fragments.
Note: Be aware that the social media sharing tools in Carousel Banner are not supported when you embed the viewer in an Experience Fragment. To work around this, you can use or create viewer presets that do not have social media sharing tools. Such viewer presets let you successfully embed it in Experience Fragments.
Specify the width and height of the Experience Fragment as it will appear on the banner.
You can also preview what the carousel banner will look like. See (Optional) Previewing Carousel Banners.
Tap Save.
Publish the carousel set. Publishing creates the embed code or URL that you can use on your website page. If you are an AEM Sites customer, you may add the carousel set directly to your webpage.
See Publishing assets.
Non-administrative users must be added to the dam-users group in order to be able to create or edit carousel banners. If you are having trouble creating or editing, please see your system administrator who can add you to the dam-users group.
You can perform a variety of editing tasks on Carousel Sets such as the following:
Be aware that if you are editing interactive images with hotspots and crop the image, your hotspots are removed.
To edit a Carousel Set:
Do any one of the following:
To edit the Carousel Set, do any of the following:
You can use Preview to see what your carousel banner will look like to customers and to test the carousel banners hotspots and image maps to ensure they are behaving as expected.
When you are satisfied with the carousel banner, you can publish it.
You can preview carousel banners from the Carousel Editor (preferred method) or from the Viewers list.
To preview carousel banners:
In Assets, navigate to an existing carousel banner that you have created and tap to open it.
Tap Edit.
In the viewer presets list in the right-hand corner of the toolbar, select a viewer to preview the carousel banner.
Tap Preview.
Tap the hotspots or image maps on the image to test their associated actions.
To preview carousel banners from the Viewers list:
You need to publish the carousel in order to use it. Publishing a Carousel Set activates the URL and Embed Code. It also publishes the carousel to the Dynamic Media cloud which is integrated with a CDN for scalable and performant delivery.
If you use an existing interactive image with hotspots for your carousel banner, you must publish the interactive image separately after you publish the carousel banner.
Also, if you modify a pre-existing published interactive image that you are using in a carousel banner, you must publish the interactive image before those changes are reflected in the carousel banner.
See Publishing Dynamic Media Assets for info on how to publish carousel banners.
After you have uploaded banner images to create a carousel, added hotspots and/or image maps to the banner, and published the carousel set, you are now ready to add it to your existing website page.
If you are an AEM Sites customer, you can add the carousel banner directly to your page by dragging the Interactive Media component to your page. See Adding Dynamic Media Assets to Pages.
However, if you are a stand-alone AEM assets customer you can manually add the carousel banner to your website landing page as described in this section.
Copy the published carousel set’s embed code.
Add the embed code that you copied from AEM Assets to your webpage.
The copied embed code is responsive so it should automatically fit the embedding area of the page.
This task applies only if you are a standalone AEM Assets customer.
The last step in this process is integrating the carousel banner with an existing Quickview implementation on your website. Every Quickview implementation is unique and a specific approach is needed that most likely involves the assistance of a front-end IT person.
The existing Quickview implementation normally represents a chain of inter-related actions that happen on the web page in the following order:
These calls may not represent independent public API calls which can be called by the web page logic from an arbitrary step. Instead, it is a chained call where every next step is hidden in the last phase (callback) of the previous step.
At the same time that the carousel banner is replacing step 1, and partially step 2, when a user clicks a hotspot or image map inside the carousel banner, such user interaction is handled by the viewer. The viewer returns an event to the web page that contains all the hotspot or image map data previously added.
In such an event handler, the front-end code does the following:
The embed code returned by AEM Assets already has a ready-to-use event handler in place that is commented out.
So, it is only necessary to uncomment the code and replace the dummy handler body with the code that is specific to the particular web page.
The process of constructing the Quickview URL is basically opposite of the process used for identifying hotspot and image map variables covered earlier.
See Identifying hotspot and image map variables.
The last step to trigger the Quickview URL and activate the Quickview panel most likely requires the assistance of a front-end IT person from your IT department. They have the knowledge to know best how to accurately trigger the Quickview implementation from the proper step, having a ready-to-use Quickview URL.
See Using Quickviews to create custom pop-ups.