• by Joe Mandese  @mp_joemandese, July 2, 2009

In a move that will make it significantly easier, faster and far more efficient for advertising agencies to buy local and national spot cable TV advertising, the leading spot cable TV rep firm, National Cable Communications, has integrated its sales systems with Donovan Data Systems, the leading provider of "back office" data processing systems for advertising agencies. The breakthrough will enable media shops to place orders and process spot cable TV buys electronically and without any manual paper insertion orders.

The transition, which happened quietly more than a month ago with many leading DDS shops making the conversion, also gives national spot cable TV the same paperless, ease-of-use as the national spot broadcast TV and radio marketplace, which converted to DDS' new, electronic Spot Desktop technology in February. The system is built on XML technology that enables agencies to send orders electronically, via email, utilizing Web links that automatically accept, confirm, modify and update media buys in the agency's systems.

Previously, local cable TV buys were processed via paper-based fax orders, and cable sales people had to manually input the orders into their electronic sales systems, increasing the chances of mistakes and discrepancies with the original orders. The process was time consuming and prone to error.

DDS executives touted the transition as a major breakthrough, estimating that agencies utilizing DDS' systems currently process more than 10 million national cable TV spots per year, representing hundreds of millions of dollars in advertising budgets. Some of the biggest agencies in the world utilize DDS systems, and since going "live" more than four weeks ago, NCC has already processed more than $3 million worth of orders electronically via DDS' Spot Desktop application.