Interactivity is 'whole new ballgame'

Despite the title of this session ("Learning new technology to leverage the classified ad leads to new revenue," held Tuesday, June 18), you don't have as much to learn technically as you might think -- especially if you've been following recent trends that encourage you to think in terms of re-cycling, re-purposing, and adding value to existing information already -- a frame of mind cherished in the worlds of audiotext and faxback classified advertising technologies. There are plenty of people already willing and able to help you with the technology end of things.

However, the experts who addressed this early morning group did have some good advice on how and what to think about if you're ready to take the next step -- running your classifieds on the Web. Panelists included Mark Carberry, VP/Professional Services at Management Process Integrators, Inc. of Scottsdale, Ariz.; Don Dornbush, President of Virtual Resources (located in the CText booth and makers of CareerSite) of Ann Arbor, Mich.; Victoria Jonas vice president of advertising operations at the Cincinnati Enquirer; Steve Burns, VP of Gannett Media Technologies International (GMTI), also of Cincinnati and makers of the AdLink product used at the Enquirer; and Greg Anderson (who was also the moderator), manager of electronic marketing at the Tacoma (Wash.) News Tribune. Accepting as given the premise that newspapers can "one-up" current classified offerings on the net, speakers focused three key areas of advertising revenue: automotive, employment, and real estate, as well as choosing between shovelware and database searching strategies, and in-house how-to versus vendor-newspaper partnership arrangements.

With Microsoft now developing CarSource and CityScape for an increasing number of markets, Carberry maintains that merely extracting from your basic print product -- using your Web opportunities as if they were an electronic broadsheet -- is not good enough if you want to keep your current franchise on classified products. To do this, you first, "have to understand interactivity as a whole new ballgame," he said. Electronic broadsheet kinds of thinking keep you trapped with the dictate to minimize lineage by using shorthand -- which creates poor on-line presentation and complicates search strategies. But people who use Internet classified products want to find something specific -- quickly and easily. You get that kind and level of interactivity with database driven classified technologies. Second, you have to understand who your customers are. There are more than you might first think: your advertisers of course, your end users, and your internal ad sellers, who can use the technology in a variety of ways to upsell.

Carberry suggests that there are several leverage points in turning your print class ad products into an Internet product:

First, database the content to provide consistency.

Surround the buyer with related local information: for example, in your automotive section, consider providing stock auto photos, dealer inventories, safety records, insurance ratings and outlets, and financing information.

Use information you collect from end users to provide qualified leads to dealers. Suggest dynamic promotions when the user content is databased to help dealers reach their ideal sellers.

Use agent technologies to make sure your buyer and seller get good matches.

Consider setting up an electronic marketplace or auction.

Second, use data with a structure and a shelf life -- entertainment, professional and trade directories. These fit well into the database -- you can easily sort them, extract them and control their presentation, and then route to either a Web site or paginate them for a print product.

Third, go beyond browsing and searching to decision support: help your user find the low-priced, vegetarian Mexican restaurant nearest to a theater playing Eraser II: The Sequel.

Provide good information to all your customers: the end user finds the best tamale, your advertiser gets good feedback on the ads. And don't forget to put the system in front of your ad seller so they can use it to upsell -- for example, an on-line coupon which can be printed from a Web browser, good for a twofer on margaritas.

How do you get there? It's not so tough, Carberry said:

Define your objectives and make your results measurable.

If you're shopping for a new classified front-end, insist on database potential.

If you aren't, at least start normalizing your print dump for potential database use.

Look at Internet approaches as supplements to your ad sellers: the future for these products is direct entry into the database by your advertiser.

Make sure your staff, and your vendor are familiar with the technology, and with new ways of thinking about classified products.

Start thinking about the issues involved in giving up your data to another service: whose brand name goes on your data? What revenue do you give up?

(For demos of the MPI application, see the Phoenix New Times site http://www.phoenixnewtimes.com or http://www.mpiinc.com.)

Virtual Resources' CareerSite http://www.careersite.com/ provides classified technology for finding both jobs and qualified candidates. Like Carberry, he urges newspapers to move quickly to ensure that they retain their classified franchise. His prescription for success complements Carberry's:

Create compelling applications for both advertisers and end users.

Integrate your Internet and print products

Look for scalable and adaptable technology

Create a great local site, then link it to a national service to provide one-stop shopping for both advertisers and end users.

CareerSite specializes in matching employment advertisers and job seekers, although its application is adaptable to both the real estate and automotive industries. It offers job seekers a well organized electronic application and job seeking process which offers original and personalized information delivery -- confidentially, as well as access to the greatest number of possible jobs. Employers, seeking quality more than quantity, get fast, accurate searching, matching applications, targeted advertising, and messaging capabilities.

Dornbush suggests that you look for technology that offers relevance ranking and concept-based vector-space matching search engine -- searching which relies on ideas rather than keywords or a formal database: for example, if you have a job for an application developer, someone who types in the word programmer should find a match. It also provides agent technology for linking the advertiser to the job seeker, as well as links to a national service. CareerSite also provides a means for single-pass processing: key concepts on the resume or the employers ad are automatically coded.

Newspapers can make money from Internet classifieds, said Dornbush, by providing the technology, the infrastructure, and the link to the national service. Revenue can also be made through subscriptions, by licensing the application to the employer or act as a service provider, brokering the content to other services, providing targeted advertising or additional information about potential employers to candidates.

The Cincinnati Enquirer has used Internet classified technology not only to increase its revenues, but to improve its relationship with its real estate advertisers. Its association with GMTI's AdLink http://www.gmti.com allows Realtors to enter and control their own ads. But before that happened, the Enquirer had to convince Realtors that they were creating a truly win-win relationship. The AdLink application provides advantages to both the advertiser and the newspaper:

The Realtor gets no surprises, control of the ad process, and later deadlines; the newspaper ends up with no errors and no refunds, and gains added credibility and sales time for its staff;

The newspaper no longer has to pay for ad layout or rekeyboarding time -- people can be used to do other things; the Realtor has the tools to generate its own reports instead of spending large sums to get them.

Once the Realtor has entered data into the newspaper's ad database, can easily update information, and the ad can be used to update corporate databases as well as for Internet advertising, mall kiosks, audiotext, fax back (and, oh yeah, print products); the newspaper, having once lured the advertiser into investing the time to enter the data on its database, increases its odds of retaining the advertiser, continuing the strength and growth of its franchise, and an improved relationship with its advertisers -- "Once you're partners in information with Realtors," said Jonas, "you create new possibilities."

Rather than rely on a vendor to provide the know-how to launch its on-line advertising presence, the Tacoma News Tribune's in-house staff used Visual Basic to turn its electronic bulletin board into an Internet classified product -- TribNet http://www.tribnet.com. The News Tribune charges a penny a line and is seeing around $2000 a month in increased revenues. It has taken the more straightforward approach of stripping the markup from its SII http://www.sii.com classified ad dump, shipping the dump as a text file, then using its in-house programs to parse the file by ad and by category. The site is menu-driven for category selection, and updated and indexed every morning. The paper can track hits through the log file, and create a monthly report using WebTrends to see who looks at which site.

Despite their differing strategies, all panelists agree that if you're using the Internet as a classified ad revenue resource, you're losing money.

-- L. Carol Christopher

A production of The Cole Group, Copyright (c) 1996, All Rights Reserved.

Last updated: 7 July, 1996.

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