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Sponsored products

Sponsored products are items that appear in highly visible locations throughout the customer shopping journey. Carrot Ads API returns a maximum of 100 sponsored products per request. When you display sponsored products, the word "Sponsored" must appear on the item card.

The following image shows an example of a sponsored product in an item card:

Shows a sponsored product in an item card. The Sponsored label appears in the upper right corner.

Display locations​

You can include sponsored products wherever it makes sense in your site. For example, you might put them in a buy-it-again collection on the homepage or in a department collection.

The following example shows sponsored products in a Buy It Again collection:

Shows sponsored products in the first three positions in the collection grid.

Display position​

Each sponsored product has a predefined display position within the item grid where they are displayed. The display position is calculated based on an ad's relevance. When ads are highly relevant, they have a low display position value so that the sponsored products appear at the beginning of a group of products. Otherwise, they are assigned a higher display position.

When merging sponsored products with your catalog products, retain the display position. For example, if you have sponsored products with display positions 1, 2, 3, 7, and 8, place the catalog products in positions 4, 5, 6, and all positions from 9 onwards on a page.

The following image shows an example of sponsored products in a grid:

Shows sponsored products positions 1, 2, 3, 7, and 8 in the collection grid.

In the following cases, you might want to change how you display the set of products:

  • More sponsored products than catalog products. If Carrot Ads API returns more sponsored products than you have catalog products to display, you can drop the sponsored products that would otherwise appear after the last catalog product.
  • Duplicates. If Carrot Ads API returns a sponsored product that is also in your set of catalog products to display, you can either drop the catalog product or place the catalog product further away from the sponsored product.
  • Product is out of stock or discontinued. If you share inventory with Instacart, then Carrot Ads uses availability algorithms to determine if a sponsored product is running out of stock. On low inventory, the sponsored product ad isn't returned.
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