Custom fields

Capture customized inputs for reports
Administrator user role required.  Requires the "Administrator" role or roles with similar permissions to configure network settings.

Customized data can be captured in Ad Manager by creating custom fields in different places, such as line items or orders. Custom fields are useful if you want people in your Ad Manager network to enter information that isn't available in Ad Manager by default. This information is then visible to other users and can be reported upon later.

For example, you might want traffickers to create a custom identifier that indicates which sales team worked on a line item. You or someone at your organization can then later report against the value indicated.  Custom fields can apply to orders, line items, creatives, proposals, and proposal line items.

Creating custom fields requires the "Administrator" role or roles with similar permissions. Anyone with permission to use Ad Manager reporting can report on custom fields.

We'll cover the following topics:

Create and manage custom fields

You'll need to decide where you want the custom field to appear and what kind of input or value the custom field takes—number, text, toggle (yes or no), or a drop-down of values you define. When active, custom fields are show under the "Settings" tab of the page where you want them to appear.

  1. Sign in to Google Ad Manager.
  2. Navigate to Admin and then Global settings and then Custom fields.
  3. Click New custom field.
  4. Enter a name for the custom field.
  5. Choose a location for the custom field. Location is the object type where you want the custom to be shown. You can assign up to 30 custom fields to each object type.
  6. (Optional) Enter a description of the custom field.
  7. Set the access level for Ad Manager users. All of your custom fields should be set to "Editable" unless you have special cases for third-party applications.
    • Editable: Users can edit and change values
    • Read-only: Users can view but not edit field
    • Hidden: Users can't view or edit

    If you change the level of access (in other words, from editable to hidden or read-only), any values that users entered are preserved and can be viewed in reports.

    Third-party applications and read-only or hidden custom fields

    Read-only or hidden custom fields are typically set via the Ad Manager API by third-party applications. Users of these third-party applications need to created or modify objects in Ad Manager and include information that isn't available in Ad Manager by default—for example, an ID that helps identify a campaign in the third-party application. The values of these custom fields are then visible to users in the Ad Manager user interface or in reports. All custom fields can be edited through the API, regardless of the access you set.

  8. Choose the custom field type.
    • Number: The value can be any number.
    • Toggle: The value is either Yes or No.
    • Text: The value can be any text string.
    • Drop-down: The value is chosen from a set of values that you enter. You can add up to 300 values once you've created and saved the custom field.
  9. If the custom field location is "Line item," choose whether this custom field should appear in order line item listings with the the "Show in table" toggle. 

Limitation when editing custom fields

You can make changes to custom fields once they're created with some limitations.

Item Limitation
Location and type Location and type cannot be changed once the custom field has been saved.
Drop-down custom fields

If you've created options for a drop-down custom field, you can't change the custom field to another type.

If you change a drop-down option, the change will be reflected throughout Ad Manager, including reports for dates prior to the change.

Changes to access levels If you change a custom field to read-only or hidden, any values that have previously been set are retained. If you change the custom field back to a visible access level, you'll be able to see the previously set values again.

Report on custom fields

Custom fields can be found as reporting attributes for the dimension that represents their location. For example, if you created a custom field called "TSP report ID" for line items, you would then later be able to find it as an attribute under the line item dimension.

A maximum of fifteen custom field attributes can be selected per dimension.

Learn more about how to:

Use API information to pull reports with custom fields

Ad Manager supports reading custom field data in reports and entities.
  • For reports, there is a field for IDs on the ReportQuery.
  • For entities, there is a customFieldValues field on all entities that support custom fields.
See all custom field attributes with CustomFieldService.getCustomFieldsByStatement

 

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