(Editor’s note: The following is an edited version of an article submitted to Newspapers & Technology by CNI Corp.)

Newsday is all but through with a project to convert all its advertisers to a Web-enabled self-service program following the deployment of AdDesk software from CNI Corp.

The Long Island, N.Y., newspaper rolled out AdDesk in a bid to simplify workflow and improve communication between the advertising and prepress departments, according to James Kober, prepress manager.

Newsday’s CNI AdDesk software gives advertisers submitting materials
online easy-to-understand instructions as they prepare their ads.
The paper said the software simplifies workflow and
improves communications.
Source: Newsday
 

AdDesk was selected to manage the approximately 1,500 PDF ad files Newsday receives each week from advertisers and agencies. Prior to rolling out the app, the paper had to fetch ads from a variety of sources, ranging from Web sites and e-mail to dedicated transmission services such as AdTransit and AdSend, Kober said.

 

“Everywhere we turned, an ad was coming in,” said Kober, who added that on high-volume nights such as Wednesday and Thursday, as many as 450 ads flow through the operation.

Disparate flows

Managing such a disparate flow required Newsday to take as many as 15 manual steps to ensure that ads were matched to the correct reservation, properly prepared for publication and inspected for technical problems before the resulting PDF ad file was sent to the pagination system.

AdDesk cut the steps needed to five, Kober said. “Our new workflow is simple and automated,” he said. Additionally, the paper has been able to cut overtime during busy periods, eliminate bad PDFs and trim staffing levels.

AdSend now oversees all ads arriving to the paper from the major ad transmission networks, which means Newsday staffers need only monitor one system instead of five, Kober said. Prepress operators can see every ad, and every version change, regardless of how it arrived, via one application.

Newsday also told local advertisers to post their ads to its AdDesk Web site instead of sending e-mails - a step that immediately cut off the more than 250 advertising e-mails the paper received each week.

The result? PDF ads now arrive at Newsday pre-matched to the correct insertion order; a huge time savings that also drives an improvement in accuracy, CNI said.

Matching ads

An AdDesk feature enables the advertiser to match its ad file to its ad reservation. “Before AdDesk, we would get ads from people we didn’t know,” Kober said. “Sometimes we didn’t know how to contact them and spent considerable time and effort to track down the correct salesperson  before we could process the ad.”

AdDesk’s AdBrowser report lets sales staffers monitor which ads have arrived and identify version changes; sales reps can view and print ads from their workstations as needed and ad agencies automatically receive a confirmation after their ads are uploaded.

Newsday meshed AdDesk with its OneVision Software’s Asura PDF inspection app to catch any technical problems with the file. This gives the paper time to correct glitches before deadline, CNI said.

Next up for the paper: Using AdDesk to manage art and text for ads it builds for advertisers. It is also planning to use the app to oversee classified ad photos, replacing the current system in which these photos are e-mailed to the paper.