Integration Phases | Yext Hitchhikers Platform

What You’ll Learn

By the end of this unit, you will be able to:

• List and define the four integration phases
• Understand the two methods offered for adding a search bar
• Explain the differences between JS Snippet vs. Subdomain at a high level

Overview

Integrating a Search experience can be broken up into four phases:

1. Adding and/or updating a search bar on the main domain (in the header or through an “overlay” module)
2. Adding a Search domain
3. Publishing the experience to production (after completing QA in staging)
4. Standing up the search results page

Adding a Search Bar on the Main Domain

A search bar can be added to the main domain through one of the following:

1. A classic search bar
   • If you add a search bar to your site, you will link the user out to a separate results page where your Search experience will be served. We recommend adding a prominent search bar to the header where it can be accessed across your site. You can also add a search bar to your homepage and any other pages.
2. An “overlay” module
   • If you add a search bar through the “overlay” option, users can run searches in a popup panel on the current page. You can then present search results inline within the overlay panel, or you can use a redirect URL and link the user out to a separate search results page.

Add a Domain

This consists of adding a search domain to the Yext platform and assigning it to your Search site. The domain format you select will depend on your results page integration path (either JS Snippet or Subdomain).

Publishing the Experience

This phase consists of standing up a search experience in staging for testing and then in production for integration. You already learned about how to publish to staging in the Deploy an Experience unit, and you’ll need to publish to production now that you’ve thoroughly QA’d the experience.

Standing Up the Search Results Page

A results page is required to go live if you are adding a search bar to your header or using the overlay module and linking the user out to a results page. However, you do not need to create a results page if you are using the overlay module without a redirect URL (results will instead be inline within the overlay). To stand up a results page, there are two paths - “JS snippet” or “subdomain”.

JS Snippet vs. Subdomain

The “JS snippet” integration path means the integration will be injected onto an existing (or newly created) search results page with a JavaScript snippet. The “subdomain” integration path means the experience will live off a subdomain on the main site using a CNAME. At a high level, the main difference between these two methods for standing up a search results page is the header/footer implication (due to the differences in how the search experience is surfaced).

Note

We also have out-of-the-box integrations for certain content management systems and website builders. You can find all available integrations in the  App Directory .