"We've worked with The Ad Wizard team for nearly five years and have found them to be top notch."
~ Bob Kinney, Information Technology, Denver Newspaper Agency

2002 marked a year of change for Pre-Press Director Bob Kinney (now Vice President, I.T.) and his staff: only two years previous that area's Rocky Mountain News and The Denver Post had joined to become the Denver Newspaper Agency. The daily broadsheet and weekly tab maintained independent newsrooms, but their circulation, prepress and advertising departments were consolidated.

Kinney found himself responsible for controlling the costs of two disparate business systems. DNA completed a cost analysis study that found that a single quarter page spec ad took upwards of $65 in design time alone. DNA's in-house human resource, circulation and promotion ads also drained the agency's resources at up to $40 an ad in similar costs.

He threw a challenge out to The Ad Wizard: configure a system that will reduce the cost of spec and house ads, make it simple enough that a customer or sales support staff could do it; and do so a fraction of the cost.

"As a vendor, they're very flexible and helpful. The site is up and available to our customers with little or no down time. Their technical staff is extremely cooperative ~ we've been very pleased with the level of support and service they provide."

The Ad Wizard and Denver Newspaper Agency teams collaborated to make a good thing better. The Ad Wizard added custom templates to the existing inventory of several million, and with them DNA ran a "Daily Deal" circulation promotion that invited local business to distribute papers in exchange for a free ad ~ created on The Ad Wizard. Within weeks 46 new advertisers had used The Ad Wizard to publish twice as many ads.

The Ad Wizard developers also added modules so advertisers could book and pay for their ads while they were online; DNA staff could view the progress of the ads; and everyone received automatically-generated emails from start to finish.

Today, Denver Newspaper Agency estimates that a spec or house ad costs as little as $4 and $12 an ad ~ a cost saving of up to 80%. Where self-serve print display ads didn't exist in 2002, they now average 1,500 ads a month. Denver Newspaper Agency accepted 1,200 new Ad Wizard account requests in 2007, and that translates into 1,200 voluntary prospects.

For Kinney, that adds up to more than 3 million dollars of new revenue per year that DNA might not have seen otherwise.

"The site is easy to use for our staff and customers ~ we receive a steady stream of advertisers who come through the Ad Wizard."

View Samples.