Polling sources allow you to connect external data to an account in Fluency. They are read-only, meaning Fluency does not edit or change any information in the polling source. Fluency supports formats such as CSV, TSV, JSON, text, and XML.
How to set up a polling source
Create a data feed with the account data you want to use in your campaigns, such as an inventory feed. In this example, we'll use Google Sheets.
Tip: Need to target specific locations with your campaigns? Follow Fluency's location-targeting syntax when setting up a data feed.
Within the Google Sheet, go to File > Share > Publish to web.
Under Link, choose the specific tab you want to link.
To the right of that field, select Comma-separated values (.csv).
Click Publish.
The link generated in the field below will be the link to the polling source that you'll input in Fluency.
Note: Make sure that your polling source has given access to anyone on the web to ensure that Fluency can ingest the data.
Adding a polling source
Option #1: Configure a feed for one account (polling source)
To set up a polling source for a single account, follow the steps below, or you can also go through our in-platform walkthrough.
Go to Manage in the top menu.
Select an account from the list.
Click Account Settings in the top right.
Select the Blueprints tab and then the Polling Sources tab.
Click + Add New.
Add a List Name that pertains to the data you're using (e.g., inventory, images, specials, etc.). Note: The name is case sensitive, so watch for unintended spaces or capitalized letters. If you plan to use this polling source in a Blueprint, make sure the naming convention is the same.
Configure the optional fields (see below for more details).
Under Endpoint, paste the link you generated for your polling source. The URL protocol will automatically update, so ensure there is no double protocol (e.g., https://https://).
Click Save to finish.
Option #2: Configure a feed for multiple accounts (account data set templates)
Click Settings & Tools (gear icon) in the top menu.
Select Data Sources in the dropdown menu.
In the Account Data Set Templates section, click + Template.
Give the template a Name that pertains to the data you're using (e.g., Inventory, Images, Specials, etc.). Note: The name is case sensitive, so watch for unintended spaces or capitalized letters. If you plan to use this polling source in a Blueprint, make sure the naming convention is the same.
Configure the optional fields (see below for more details).
Under Endpoint, paste the link you generated for your polling source. The URL protocol will automatically update, so ensure there is no double protocol (e.g., https://https://).
Click Save to finish.
Note: Your polling source will refresh based on your chosen frequency. However, you can manually refresh it before Fluency automatically updates it by clicking Refresh Data or Refresh Template under Update Frequency. You'll need to expand open the information for your polling source or account data set template to locate the manual refresh button.
Optional fields
Here are optional fields and what they do for configuring polling sources:
Data Filter: Add one if you want to exclude data. A data filter is necessary to associate the information contained in each row of the polling source with the account in Fluency. A simple way to do this would be for the polling source to include a column with the Fluency UUID. Assuming the column name is UUID, the data filter would look like this: UUID={owneruuid}.
Update Frequency: Specify how often the polling source should refresh. The default refresh is every 24 hours.
Extract Media: Toggle on if you're pulling images from a Google Drive or other sources.
Stale Data Threshold: If your data updates regularly, inputting a number of days will result in Fluency checking to make sure the updates are happening.
Using RSS feeds as a polling source
RSS feeds publish in XML format and can be used as a data source to bring in blog content for advertising. For RSS feeds, Fluency provides an HTML Cleanser tool that removes HTML tags and forms unique pieces of data within the feed. This separation allows you to use images and text separately in your campaigns.