By Mindy Williams

There's nothing like a media client. In many agencies, especially the bigger shops, they make the big money. And while the future may be all about interactive advertising, there are still huge dollars to be made from the everyday print, dradio, and television ads -- and someone's got to plan, order, and track them.

If that someone is you, you're looking at a paperwork nightmare. First, there's the planning process. Working back-and-forth with clients to produce the perfect media plan takes time. And with dozens of campaigns for dozens of clients, the hours really add up. But the media plan is just the start.

Then there are the hundreds of insertion orders and broadcast orders ... media buys by the thousands ... the client billings ... and all those vendor invoices. Mess up at any point and the shop's reputation takes a hit -- as well as its bottom line. That's why an organized, efficient media tracking system -- like Clients & Profits -- is essential.

If you're an experienced media buyer you probably have a proven system for planning and ordering media and need Clients & Profits less. But if you're new to the media buying process, (or it's suddenly a new part of your job) then Clients & Profits offers a system for managing the entire media work flow: preparing media estimates, creating insertion orders, billing media to clients, then reconciling billings with media vendor invoices.

The right fit

So how do you know if Clients & Profits is right for your media department? Any shop that buys mostly tv, radio, or cable needs a media buying system like Strata, SmartPlus, or TAPSCAN. These systems provide updated rating and demographic data to help media buyers pick the right audiences and markets, but are expensive.

But if your shop handles mostly spot buys and print advertising, then Clients & Profits' media capabilities are ideal. That's because it is designed to work with media buying systems (Clients & Profits can even import media buys from SmartPlus, TAPSCAN, and Strata, eliminating the double-entry you may be doing now.)

Managing the work flow...

Clients & Profits lets media buyers create detailed broadcast and print media plans for a user-defined list of times/programs and ad sizes. A media plan can contain buys from many different stations or publications, which are used to create insertion orders without rekeying. Print and broadcast orders integrate with job tickets, so they're easy to traffic with the rest of production. The Media Recap window highlights the week's space closings, material due dates, and other important deadlines all in one place -- and even notifies staff members via e-mail.

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