This follows a highly successful period dating back to 2009 when the same system was run through the UK and the Republic of Ireland, says Wave2. This solution was known as Mag Ad Manager (MAM) throughout the European dealer community and it will continue to be known by the same name in South Africa.
Wave2’s automated AdPortal software package provides the publisher with a fully integrated and enhanced solution for its motor and truck dealers. It enables them to create their own advertisements with the absolute minimum of human intervention by virtue of the software helping to define the ad content before it then automatically creates the ad layout.
Chris Hodges, Managing Director of Wave2, takes up the story: “The issue for Auto Trader is that motor and truck dealers are used to a very personal level of service from the publisher, where a sales person would help to compile a new advert for the customer for every edition of the publication. Ad content is also likely to change up to the very last minute with new cars or trucks coming into stock all the time. Our software needs to mimic this high level of customer service whilst reducing the costs of creating an ad.”
The solution installed at Auto Trader South Africa integrates with the central stock database which houses the details of vehicles supplied by the dealer for online promotion. Based on a set of pre-agreed ad building rules the system automatically decides which vehicles are most appropriate to be included in the advert and therefore extracts the details of each vehicle, along with an image if available. The software then sorts the basic vehicle descriptions via a number of elements that it expects to find. These might include, for example, the make of vehicle, the model, the age, or the price. Depending on the individual motor dealer’s preferences, the advert can be automatically created by managing a combination of these variables and ordering the cars in question.
“This might mean”, says Chris “that the priority vehicles for a BMW specialist are BMW’s, which will rank above any other makes. Order might then be determined by the price of the car, with higher priced vehicles in his stock taking priority to appear in the ad. The highest value BMW manufactured within the last three years could even be highlighted as the star product of the week – the Wave2 software will add the relevant typographic detail to this particular part of the advert to make this product stand out from the rest of the vehicles.”
Once the ad has been created by the Wave2 system an e-mail is automatically sent to the motor dealer providing him with the option to make manual changes to the advert if required. If the deadline passes with no changes from the dealer then the advert is deemed acceptable. For the publisher, this process saves considerable production time, as well as time spent chasing the dealer for final approval.
Commenting on the intricacies of the Wave2 software that has been created for Auto Trader, Chris Hodges said: “This is one of the most sophisticated systems that we have developed to date. Our software was initially developed to manage the variables involved in layout including, of course, the actual content of the ad as defined by the user. In the Auto Trader system our rules structure is actually helping to determine what the content is before we fit that content into the predefined advertisement space.”
About Wave2
Wave2 says: “Wave2 Media Solutions was formed in early 2004 specifically to develop a range of solutions for the automated generation of documents. With an impressive installed base around the world, Wave2’s mission is to provide tools that will enable publishers and content providers to both save costs and to generate new revenue. Wave2’s product range includes solutions for Self Service Advertising, Production Automation, Sales Visuals Creation, Automatic Page Assembly and Personalised Publishing.”
