ebook - 21 questions you should ask your print ad management vendor

21 questions you should ask before selecting a

Print ad management system in 2015

databasedads.com

Data Based Ads, Inc. 21 questions to ask your real estate print ad management system vendor 2

ContentsRe-evaluating your print ad management system ........................................3

Real estate print advertising isn’t what it used to be. ................................................ 3

Data integration ................................................................................................4Can you integrate my existing data? .......................................................................... 4Do I need to do any manual input? ............................................................................. 4

Scheduling / ordering .......................................................................................5How much time will my administrative staff have to spend building ads? .................. 5Does the system eliminate the endless proofing cycle? ............................................. 6Does the system enforce listing content relevance geographically? .......................... 6How do you track open houses? ................................................................................ 7Can multiple staff members order a single multi-office ad without interaction? .......... 7

Ad production ...................................................................................................8Does the system eliminate the need for in-house ad production? .............................. 8Does the system eliminate the packaging and sending of data to various media? .... 8If I want to do production in-house, am I able to do it in an automated fashion? ................................................................ 9

Real estate books ...........................................................................................10Can I use the system to build my in-house real estate publication? ......................... 10Does the system allow you to create an entire agent-paid publication? ................... 10

Expense tracking – e-commerce ..................................................................11Does the system seamlessly track listing, agent and office expense? ......................11Does the system have an e-commerce function? .....................................................11

Agent ads .......................................................................................................12Can the system deal with agent ads that are not company sponsored? .................. 12

Database value-added apps .........................................................................13Does it integrate other print functions? ..................................................................... 13Does it integrate your online advertising? ................................................................ 14

Ease of use / accessibility .............................................................................15How about software support? ................................................................................... 15Is the system easy to navigate? ............................................................................... 15Can the system be operated on all devices? ............................................................ 15

The bottom line ...............................................................................................16Can you justify the expense? ................................................................................... 16


Re-evaluating your print ad management system

Real estate print advertising isn’t what it used to be.

Not exactly a revelation.

In an increasingly non-print world, real estate print advertising may occupy a smaller space in your marketing plan, but it continues to be significant to market segments that value print. And the logistics of putting out effective listing-based print ads is as chal-lenging and time consuming as ever.

More often than not these days, a print advertising program is less about advertising the entire inventory and more about showcasing the properties that draw attention to your brokerage...putting your best foot forward.

So a database marketing system will certainly make your print advertising administration more efficient, and the ads more effective — but to be cost-effective. and resource-effective, your software should probably go facilitate other marketing programs beyond print.

But for this book, we’ll stick to the print ad management portion of your marketing database. If you’re looking to organize your print marketing or re-evaluating your current ad management system –

ask these questions of your advertising database vendor...


Can you integrate my existing data?

The answer should be yes – on all fronts. MLS feeds are a must as a root source of data. You may already aggregate data from several sources and your ad management vendor should have the capabilities to take your feed as well. They should also have the capa-bility to blend feeds to get the best results.

In short, make sure your ad management vendor has the technical capabilities to flow data between all of your data sources – MLSs, photographers, publishers, web vendors and so on. Including those you don’t yet have.

Do I need to do any manual input?

The short answer should be no. Manual input should be an option, not a requirement. There will always be exceptions where users may want to input a listing manually and the system should allow for that.

Data integration

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How much time will my administrative staff have to spend building ads?

That’s a pretty open question, but in short, your staff should have to spend only as much time as it takes him/her to decide which listings will go into an ad.

And you should have the tools to make quick decisions. The ability to segregate eligible listings and a full set of ad scheduling features should be available to ensure that the selection process is simple and quick.

Ad parametersMost print publications or sections of a publica-tion define a specific targeted profile defined by geographic area, price range, property type or time-on-market – to name a few. When selecting listings to be included in an ad, only the eligible listings for that ad should surface as a choice for that section.

Real-time proofsImmediate real-time online proofs should be available to check and validate ad content, including edit links to make immediate changes to the ad content when necessary.

Office-level admins should not need to wade through non-office listings in a multi-office ad proof. They should be able to view and proof only the listings they are responsible for.

System-wide accessAll management users who may need or want to see a particular ad proof should have access to view the proof and make adjustments when warranted.

Scheduling / ordering

3 Ad selection services

Ideally, your ad management vendor should offer a service that selects the ads for you based on your selection criteria.

If you have a regular schedule and a set of rules that define the way you select your advertised listings every week, the vendor should be able to apply those rules to the database and select the listings per your guidelines.

As an example: Your company creates a weekly ad for a specific geographic group above a certain price range. Your weekly ad selection process consists of selecting new listings that week, then properties that are open, then price changes, then filling in the excess with properties that haven’t been advertised in four weeks or more, but have not been on the market for 90 days without a price change.

Your vendor should offer a service to do that for you, with you, the client having the final word, i.e., access to make additions and cancellations via the online proof.



4 Why shouldn’t I demand WYSIWYG* proofs?

Systems that offer exact proofing typically limit their ad offerings to a handful of specific pre-programmed design formats. That doesn’t work for most real estate companies. who want to vary the way their ads look.

To be economically feasible, a good system needs to develop a linear proof spec that can be ultimately printed in an unlimited variety of formats.

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Does the system eliminate the endless proofing cycle?

A good ad management system will pull the data together specific to a particular ad size or listing space within a given ad page and present the data to the user – sorted and formatted. The user should be able to trust that what s/he sees will be represented letter by letter on the printed page.

The online proof should be legible, sorted vertically and contain all the elements that will be printed in a repre-sentation that is easy to comprehend.

Does the system enforce listing content relevance geographically?

Your print advertising needs to serve the ultimate ad viewer with relevance – otherwise it’s a waste of ad dollars.

Your ad system should prevent the advertising of out-of-area properties in a geographically designated ad section or publication. That is not to say that there aren’t relevant exceptions, but your system should first categorize listings for their relevance to an ad or ad section, but still allow for exceptions when warranted.

The same goes for other parameters – like price range and property types.


How do you track open houses?

Open houses are a driving force of some advertising programs and should be easy to manage. Make sure that your ad system does not require open house submission on each scheduled ad.

Your open house should be a single entry, which in turn permeates all ads and feeds associated with the listing. If the open is canceled, it should likewise pull the infor-mation – in real time.

Ideally, your system integrates with your MLS. Open house inclusion in a feed can negate the need for any additional open house scheduling in your ad system.

Can multiple staff members order a single multi-office ad without interaction?

Remote entry and verification is at the heart of any good ad management system. Office administrators in remote office locations should be able to order and proof their allocated portion of any ad, without having to interact with the other participants – or their ad content.

The system should provide and enforce deadlines for orders, requirements for content, and alerts when participants are short on an allocation or delayed with their input. While oversight at a higher level should be possible, pre-planning the ad structure can very often make that oversight unnecessary.


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Does the system eliminate the need for in-house ad production?

Your ad system should allow you to manage your ads – not require you to produce them.

Virtually all publishers have art departments that will build your ads. What you need is an ad management system that can deliver the content to your publications that precisely fits the count and design of each of your ad pages – and make it accessible to publishers in way that is clearly marked and sorted to your specifications.

This way you’re creating your ad scheme once, setting the standards for a publications’ art department once – then letting the system deliver new content week after week.

You will never need to do your own production again.

Does the system eliminate the packaging and sending of data to various media?

It should. Your ad management system should offer secure access to each publication, and allow any publisher to view and retrieve ad content from their publications’ ads only.

Ad production

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If I want to do production in-house, am I able to do it in an automated fashion?

Your ad system should be able to connect your data with popular publishing software like InDesign®, where the output is fast and accurate.

Your ad system should allow a pre-determined designed format to accept and convert your ad system’s raw text and image data into a finished product, ready for PDF creation and delivery to a publication.

Programs like InDesign® allow the incorporation of several data types into endless design possibilities, whether they are ads, brochures or other listing-based print material.

Can my publications use this type of production automation?

Your ad system may allow licensing of their automated production software to publishers who are willing to use it on their mutual clients’ behalf.

Your benefit would be that the data is never re-keyed or copy/pasted, which improves accuracy. And it would be to the publisher’s benefit for the same reason.

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Ad production


Can I use the system to build my in-house real estate publication?

A weekly, monthly or occasional real estate publication is nothing more than a series of ad offerings in various formats.

Of course your ad system should be able to facili-tate the ordering and production – even the payment aspects of the book – as these books are typically agent-paid at some level.

Does the system allow you to create an entire agent-paid publication?

Your system needs the capacity to charge different amounts for different ad pages and products – agents should be able to buy a whole page or group of pages, split the cost with a co-lister, or participate in series by buying a single or a group of single ad spots.

Real estate books

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Does the system seamlessly track listing, agent and office expense?

Expense tracking is imperative when spreading the varying costs of print advertising across offices / profit centers. Reporting those costs in easily analyzed formats should assist in collection of agent debt and limiting expense in poor-performing profit centers.

Your ad system should track the cost of each ad page, should weight and distribute that cost over varying size ads within the page, and assign the cost of each listing ad to the appropriate office and/or agent.

Does the system have an e-commerce function?

Your ad management system should also serve the accounting department.

The system should be able to assign the spread of an invoice over your profit centers.

More and more, agent-paid publications are the norm. An ad offering that requires credit-card payment mitigates the company headache of collecting payment and/or keeping track of billable ads.

You should be able to have the option of collecting the entire cost, a subsidy, or a premium on any ad.

Expense tracking – e-commerce

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Can the system deal with agent ads that are not company sponsored?

You’d like to help your agents who advertise on their own in local publications, but you may not want your administrative staff to become involved or responsible for an agent-initiated ad buy.

Your ad system should enable you to schedule an agent ad where only that individual agent (or agents) has access to the ordering and delivery of the ad content. Your agents would enjoy the same benefits of quick ordering and proofing using the existing ad content. The company will be providing an agent benefit with only minimal involvement.

Agent ads

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Does it integrate other print functions?

Listing-related print materials like flyers, brochures, listing sheets, and postcards should also be an option, both as one-click output, and customizable one-off applications.

One-click output takes the burden off the administrative staff – as users (agents) can log in and access listing brochure, postcard and other collateral output with a click. Content is based on whatever images and text are in the database at the time.

Marketing and design departments should have the option to pull the data out of the system via XML output that facilitates automated content import into common design software, like InDesign®, which will enable custom print collateral designs in a fraction of the typical production time.

Database value-added apps

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Does it integrate your online advertising?

Once you’ve invested in a marketing database that you will presumably enhance with better-than-MLS photog-raphy and copy, you want to be able to extend its use to your online portals.

Any good ad management system has feed capabilities in and out, and those feed capabilities should not only extend to listing syndication, but to interaction of data sets that companies use with other vendors, such as photographers, tour vendors and the like.

Additionally, your ad management system vendor would do well to offer some of those online functions to their users directly through their system interface – like virtual tours, video, HTML email, single property websites, social media interaction and push notifi-cations of listing and open house activity directly to agents.

Database value-added apps

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How about software support?

Software and technical support should be a given. Even in a completely automated system, the complex minutia of ad structure typically requires occassional human interaction at the planning level. Be sure that that kind of support is there and readily available, both for the corporate staff and administrative users in individual offices.

Is the system easy to navigate?

Ad systems are inherently complex so making it easy to use is a challenge. When looking at a new system, ask the vendor to demonstrate on the system how certain tasks get accomplished. Ask specific questions. The vendor should be more than willing to spend as much time as it takes to let you see how easy the system operates, assuming that it is.

Can the system be operated on all devices?

Ad management systems may not normally operated from smartphones, but sometimes it just becomes necessary, as we all know. Look for a responsive web interface that can be used on any device.

Ease of use / accessibility

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Can you justify the expense?

The expense should be analyzed against man-hours saved and efficiencies realized, but also against quality of output.

Are you paying your admins to do collection and distri-bution of ad materials, proofing, or communicating with agents vying to secure the right content. Is this the best use of their time or expertise?

Are you making uneducated guesses on which listings to advertise? Which sellers need attention? Which listings will evoke more engagement in a print ad? Will a good ad system refine those choices?

Does the ad management system add value in other areas served by its database, such as online marketing tools and delivery?

All are valid considerations.

The bottom line

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ebook - 21 questions you should ask your print ad management vendor

Real Estate

system deal

system easy

ad production

office ad

agent ads

real estate books

print functions

data integration