Publishing content

  • Release version: Xanadu
  • Updated August 1, 2024
  • 3 minutes to read
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    Summary of Publishing content

    Content Publishing in ServiceNow enables you to create, schedule, and deliver portal content to employees efficiently. It supports publishing through two primary methods: publish plans via the Content Library and scheduling content via the Schedule content form. This functionality allows you to control where content appears, who sees it, and for how long it is available, enhancing targeted communication across your organization.

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    Publishing Methods

    • Publish plans via Content Library: Integrated into the Content Library workflow, publish plans offer robust configuration options including content placement, audience targeting, and publishing duration. They are suited for news, rich, or portal content types.
    • Schedule content form: Used to configure delivery for mobile content, notifications, to-dos, pulse surveys, Facebook Workplace, and Employee Forums. It is also required for publishing content to Workspace or UIB Workspace, as Content Library does not support these destinations.

    Publishing Destinations

    When configuring either a publish plan or schedule, you must define the destination using three fields:

    • Location: Usually Service Portal, with some content types (e.g., news articles) allowing publishing to the Now Mobile app.
    • Page: Lists portal and taxonomy pages where content will appear. You can filter pages by first selecting a widget to narrow down the page choices. Taxonomy topics require specifying taxonomy and topics, helping organize content by subject.
    • Widget: Shows supported widgets for the selected content type, ensuring content is displayed appropriately.

    Content Types and Supported Widgets

    Different content types correspond to specific widgets for proper display. For example:

    • Banners use Banner and Welcome Banner widgets.
    • Calendar events use Calendar Event widgets.
    • News articles use News Feed and Featured News widgets.
    • Rich content utilizes Rich Content and Styled Content widgets.
    • Videos are displayed via the Video Carousel widget.

    You can customize content types and widgets through configuration options to meet your organizational needs.

    Scheduling Content

    The Schedule content form allows you to define when and where your content is delivered, including:

    • Dates: Start and end dates for content availability.
    • Location: Service Portal or Workspace.
    • Page and Widget: Specific page and widget instance where content appears.
    • Audiences: Target users or groups for content delivery.
    • Taxonomy and Topics: Organize content under common subjects for easier discovery, including scheduling content within topic pages.

    Scheduling Content Form Details

    The form captures essential metadata and configuration, including:

    • Title: Identifies the scheduled content record, defaulting to the content name.
    • Approvers: Optional references for required content approval prior to publishing.
    • Active state: Controls whether the scheduled content is currently available.
    • Content location specifics: Defines exact page, widget, and component type for placement, including sys ID for Agent Workspace components.
    • Targeted users and availability dates: Specifies audience targeting and content availability period.

    Practical Benefits for ServiceNow Customers

    This publishing framework enables you to deliver timely, relevant content to your employees across multiple channels, including portals, mobile, and workspaces. By leveraging targeted audiences, scheduling, and taxonomy organization, you can enhance employee engagement and ensure content reaches the right users at the right time through preferred channels.

    Use Content Publishing to create, schedule, and deliver your portal content to your employees.

    Content publishing offers two options for publishing your content:
    Publish plans via Content Library
    Publish plans are integrated in the Content Library workflow and offer a robust configuration options, including where the content will appear, who will see it, and publishing duration. You can create a publish plan for news, rich, or portal content. For all other content types, you must use the Schedule content form.
    Note:
    To publish content to the Workspace or UIB Workspace, you must use the Schedule content form, as the Content Library does not offer the option to publish to the Workspace or UIB Workspace.
    Publish plan features
    Schedule content form
    Configure content delivery for the following types of content using the Schedule content form:

    Publishing destinations

    When you are configuring a content schedule or publish plan, you must define the publishing destination via three fields: Location, Page, and Widget.
    Location
    For most content types, Service Portal is the only option. Some content types, such as news articles, enable you to specify a publish plan for the Now Mobile app. For more information, see Publishing news articles.
    Page
    The page field lists portal and taxonomy pages. To narrow the selection, you can first select a widget, then return to the page field, which only lists the pages that contain the widget.
    Note:
    If you select a taxonomy topic, the form prompts you to specify the taxonomy and one or more topics.
    Portal pages are managed in Service Portal > Pages.
    Taxonomy topics are managed in Taxonomy > Topics. See Unified Taxonomy for Employee Center.
    Widget
    The widgets field only lists supported widgets for that content type. For more information on the content types, see the table below.
    Table 1. Publishing locations by content type
    Content type Supported widgets
    Banner Content Experiences
    Banner Welcome Banner (CD)
    Calender Event Calender
    Event Upcoming Events (CD)
    Image-based link Quick Links (CD)
    News article News Feed
    News article Featured News
    Rich content Rich Content (CD)
    Rich text Announcements (CD)
    Styled content Content Experiences
    Styled content Styled Content (CD)
    URL Information Links (CD)
    Video Video Carousel (CE)
    To customize the content type and publishing widget, see Add or modify content type for Content Publishing

    Use Schedule Content, found under Content Publishing to define when you want your content to be available or delivered.

    Schedule content includes setting:
    • Dates: The start and end dates that your content is available.
    • Location: Where your content appears (Service Portal or Workspace).
    • Page: The page your content appears on the Service Portal.
    • Widget instance: The widget on the page your content appears.
    • Audiences: Who the content is for.
    • Taxonomy: Groups common topics.
    • Topic: Topic heading that your content appears under.
    You can also schedule content to widgets within topic pages by selecting a taxonomy and multiple topics. Doing this helps to organize and provide content specific to a topic.
    Note:
    For more information on topic pages, see Dynamic topic pages.

    Publishing schedule content

    You can schedule your content to appear in Employee Center and Workspace. The Schedule content form changes depending on where you want your content to appear. To better understand scheduling content, the information on the form can be divided in the following way:
    • Meta data: Provides the basic information required to schedule your content and includes:
      • Title: An identifiable name for your schedule content record. It defaults to the name of the content you are scheduling.
      • Approvers: You can optionally reference names of people that are required to approve of the content before it can be scheduled for access.
      • Active: You can schedule your content for access by date, but won't be available unless you activate the schedule content record.
      • State: The current state of your schedule content record.
    • Content:
      • The content you are scheduling
      • Content location by type
        • Service Portal
        • Workspace: When you choose Service Portal, the page and widget you can select and where your content appears.
      • Where your content appears:
        • Page: The page on the Service Portal you want your content to appear.
        • Widget: The widget on the page of the Service Portal you want your content to appear.
        • Content identifier: Associates portal content to Agent Workspace. This is the sys ID for the component in Agent Workspace.
        • Component type (announcement or quick link)
      • Targeted users and dates
        • The audience the content is directed to or you can add specific users you want your content directed to.
        • The start and end dates your content is available.