2. Maintaining Marketing Create and position containers Summary Containers are the advertising spaces of the shop. They are maintained under eCom \ Container. A container becomes effective in two steps: you create it, and you define how the area in which it appears is displayed. What a container is, which link types exist, and which image dimensions apply are described in the service description on the page Marketing-Container. Create container Open eCom \ Container. The list shows all existing containers with position, type, link type, and status. Use Create new container to add another one; clicking on a row opens an existing one for editing. Select Container type: Image, Image with text, or Text with image. See below. Depending on the type, add Image and Text. If the image was created with AI, check Image is AI generated — see Mark images as AI-generated. The text can be formatted using the toolbar of the Content field. The image dimensions depend on the display type of the area, see below. Set Priority. 1 appears first. If the container should only appear for certain customers, select a Customer list. Without a customer list, it appears for all. Set Link type and the associated target. Set Status to Released — only then does the container appear in the shop. Save. Provide data — with the Images checkbox, otherwise the image will be missing in the shop. Optionally, a display period can be set via From and To, for example for a limited-time promotion. Without an entry, there is no limitation. Select container type Type in float area in slider Image image only image only Image with text text to the right of the image text below the image Text with image text to the left of the image text above the image The Content field includes its own toolbar for formatting. When choosing the type, note in which Type the container appears: the same combination of image and text is displayed side by side in the float area and stacked in the slider. Text that fits next to the image in the float may appear differently above the image in the slider. Add image Use a square 900 × 900 pixel image for a float tile — also for types with text. A tile with text is twice as wide, but the image inside remains the same size as in a tile without text. So you do not need a larger image. Warning: In the float area, the image can be cropped left and right. It fills the tile height, and if a neighbouring tile has a lot of text, the entire row becomes taller. Therefore, place the motif centrally and leave margins on the sides. As a rule of thumb: use rather wide images for the slider, square ones for the float area. For the slider, the required format depends on whether it switches automatically: Display interval Recommended image size 0 — no autoplay at least 630 pixels high, aspect ratio between about 1:1 and 2.3:1, for example 945 × 630 greater than 0 — autoplay 1500 × 500 pixels (3:1) The slider does not crop. If the aspect ratio does not fit, the image is scaled smaller and gets blank stripes — for the autoplay slider on the sides if the image is too tall, and top and bottom if it is too wide. A larger image frame does not help, only the correct ratio. Warning: If you change the Display interval later, the required image format of the containers at this position also changes. The complete size table is in the service description on the page Marketing-Container. Warning: For the link type Order template, the selected order template must be enabled for eCom. See Enable order template for eCom. If a container does not appear in the shop Check in this order: Check Background Is the Status set to Released? Only this status appears in the shop. In progress, Completed, and Deleted remain invisible. Is today within the From / To period? Empty fields mean no limitation. Does the Culture match the customer's language? In the multilingual shop, the container must be maintained per language. Were the data provided with the Images checkbox? Without this checkbox, the image is missing. A container that should no longer run does not have to be deleted — Completed removes it from the shop but keeps it in the list. Define display type of the area Open eCom \ Container, submenu Items. For Type of display for the desired position — Homepage top or Homepage bottom — select Slider or Float. For Slider: set in the field Display interval whether it switches automatically. See below. Save and provide data. Display interval The field appears only for Slider. The value is entered in milliseconds: 3000 is three seconds. Value Effect 0 The slider does not switch automatically. Several cards are shown side by side; the customer navigates using the arrows left and right. greater than 0 The slider switches automatically after this time. Only one card is visible at a time, with a dot navigation below. Warning: The time applies per image, not for the entire cycle. With three containers and 3000, each image is shown for three seconds; one cycle takes nine seconds. Consider when setting: a short interval appears restless, and a container with text needs longer to read than a pure image. The switch pauses as long as the customer’s mouse is over the slider or it is focused via keyboard. If the customer clicks a dot in the dot navigation, the slider stops permanently on that image and does not start again automatically. Therefore, do not expect every customer to see all containers — important content belongs on the first container or in the float area. Both positions can be freely assigned: a slider at the top and a float area at the bottom is the usual combination, but the reverse or the same display type twice is also possible. Order of multiple containers If multiple containers are in the same area, the priority determines the order. For a slider, the shop then shows arrows and dot navigation; for a float area, the containers are stacked from left to right. Maintain texts Summary Under eCom \ Texte you maintain the texts that the customer sees in the shop — legal texts, the cookie notification, and the confirmations after registration. Distinction: The texts of the e-mails are not here, but under Basic configuration \ Settings \ E-Mail contents. See Setting up e-mail subscriptions and maintaining templates. For each block you can either store a text or a URL. If a URL is entered, the text is not displayed, but the link is opened. The available text blocks The selection is made via the field Type: Text block Where it appears in the shop Legal notice Footer, always visible Privacy policy Footer, always visible Terms and conditions Footer, only if content is stored Cookies Cookie confirmation on the login mask Support Hotline Footer, only if a text is stored Newsletter Footer, only if a text is stored Access request hint under the link Access request? Access request confirmation Message after submitting the access request Password forgotten confirmation Message after requesting a new password New customers reservation confirmation Message after submitting the form Not a customer yet? Procedure Open eCom \ Texte. Select the desired block in the field Type. Either enter a text or enter a URL. Save and provide data. The confirmation texts are your texts Four blocks determine what the customer reads after an action: Access request confirmation, Password forgotten confirmation, New customers reservation confirmation and the hint under Access request. The wordings quoted in the service description are the delivery state. You can completely replace them with your own formulations — for example, to add a telephone number for enquiries. When a URL is more useful Important: Privacy policy and Legal notice always appear in the shop always, even without maintained content — the customer then lands on a page with the wildcard text "No content is currently stored for this type." Both are mandatory information and should be filled before going live. The Terms and conditions behave differently: without content the entry does not appear at all. For Legal notice, Privacy policy and Terms and conditions a URL is worthwhile: if you link the texts of your standard homepage, you only have to maintain them in one place. For Support Hotline and Newsletter a text is more useful. Both menu items only appear in the shop if a text is stored — without text the menu item is missing. Text block "Access request hint" You need this block if you have not set the setting Not a customer yet?. Then only Access request? appears on the login mask, and this block fills the associated hint — extendable with URLs. Without the block the hint remains empty. Uploading Pictures Summary Under eCom \ Pictures you upload the two fixed graphics of the shop: the graphic on the login page your logo for the menu bar, which appears after the customer logs in The required dimensions are listed in the service description on the Marketing Container page. Procedure Open eCom \ Pictures. Select picture and perform Upload. Save. This step is mandatory — see below. Provide data, with tick Pictures. Why three steps are necessary This is the most common stumbling block: Step What happens Upload The picture is in the Temp folder. It is not visible in the shop. Save The picture is moved to the correct folder. Provide with tick Pictures The picture is transferred to the shop. If one of the last two steps is skipped, the picture does not appear — even though the upload was successful and looks correct in the backend. Pictures created with AI If a picture is marked as AI-generated, the shop displays the notice AI GENERATED above it. The tick Picture is AI generated is also available here under eCom \ Pictures, not only at the container. See Mark pictures as AI-generated. Mark pictures as AI-generated Summary From version 19 onwards, a picture can be marked as created with AI. The shop then automatically displays the note AI GENERATED above the picture. The marking is done with the checkbox Picture is AI generated below the picture. The checkbox is available in two places: under eCom \ Container on the individual container and under eCom \ Pictures for the fixed graphics of the shop. How the note looks and where it appears is described in the service description on the Marketing Container page. Procedure for the container Open eCom \ Container and edit the container. Upload the picture via Add file, if not already done. Set the checkbox Picture is AI generated below the picture. Save. Provide data, with checkbox Pictures. The checkbox is located directly below the picture preview, between Picture upload and Content. Procedure for the fixed graphics You will find the same checkbox under eCom \ Pictures for the login graphic and the logo. Procedure as with uploading — see Uploading pictures — additionally set the checkbox. The marking always applies per picture, not once for the entire shop. If no note appears Check Background Is the checkbox set and saved? Without saving, the change remains in the mask. Were the data subsequently provided with checkbox Pictures? As with every picture in the shop. Is the installation running on version 19 or newer? Older versions do not know the marking. The shop then displays the pictures normally, just without the note. What this means for picture selection The note is positioned over the picture, in the upper right corner. Therefore, choose a motif for marked pictures that does not have anything important there. See Marketing Container in the service description.