Extending and Customizing Composer
Composer offers a flexible platform for content creation, but sometimes the features you need may go beyond what is provided out-of-the-box. Fortunately, Composer includes several powerful extension mechanisms that allow you to tailor the tool to your specific needs. This guide walks you through the primary ways you can extend and customize Composer to better suit your workflows.
Power Ups
Power Ups are customizable integrations that bring external data, services, or content into Composer. They allow you to embed third-party tools, link to external databases, or add custom features that enhance your stories and address specific business needs beyond Composer's default capabilities. For more information, see Getting Started with the Custom Embed Power Up in Composer.
Examples of Power Ups
Externally-managed video or audio: If your organization uses a specific video or audio management tool that Composer doesn't natively support, you can create a Power Up that hooks into that system and displays a searchable index of videos directly within Composer.
Forms for User Input: Power Ups can allow you to embed forms within your content, where users or authors can input structured data that may not be available in Composer’s standard interface. This could be structured content for a movie review or an ingredients list of a recipe.
Third-party API Integration: If you use external services for things like analytics, eCommerce, or CRM systems, a Power Up could allow Composer to pull in relevant data (like customer data or product details) directly into your content stories.
Kickers and Labels
While Power Ups focus on integrating external data and content, Kickers and Labels allow you to define and manage custom fields for content in Composer. You can use these fields to capture additional data specific to your content or organization as well as pre-set these values ahead of time in templates .
Examples of Kickers and Labels
Custom Headlines or Subheads: If your organization uses specific types of headlines (for example, SEO-optimized titles or marketing-specific formats), you can create a Kicker that allows authors to select or input the correct format or structure for each story.
Business-specific Options: For business-specific needs, such as marketing categorizations or project-specific tags, you can use Labels to define options that apply to a specific piece of content. This might include fields like “Campaign Type,” “Marketing Category,” or “Region,” which are unique to your business processes.
Free-Form Text Inputs: For stories that require flexible data entry (for example, special instructions or custom metadata), Kickers can provide free-form text fields that authors and editors can populate as needed.
Extending Composer for your Needs
While Composer offers a broad range of features out of the box, the ability to extend and customize it with Power Ups and Kickers and Labels gives you the flexibility to create a truly tailored content creation experience. Whether you’re integrating external data, adding custom content elements, or defining new fields for categorization and metadata, Composer’s extensibility options allow you to adapt the platform to the unique needs of your team or business.
By leveraging these tools, you can make Composer a powerful, bespoke solution that fits seamlessly into your existing workflows, helping your content team create richer, more targeted stories that align with your organization’s goals.