WAN-IFRA: What were the main questions potential customers were asking regarding your solutions at World Publishing Expo in Frankfurt?

alfa Media/Peter Drinkguth: In the editorial area, the newspaper publishers were interested in solutions that permit simple publication on different channels and on various platforms. It is vital to guarantee a single process, from the planning of a topic, including the accompanying editorial management, to recording and treating multimedia contents, up to publication in print, portal and mobile devices. On the technological side, there is a demand for web-based solutions. This is where alfa Media is perfectly positioned with the alfa MediaSuite, alfa Agenda and News+.

Atex/Peter Marsh: Many of our customers were interested in seeing our OneView Advertising and Editorial products. OneView is the common browser-based user interface that gives all Atex products a consistent and customizable look-and-feel, and enable our applications to run on any PC, Mac, tablet or browser-enabled device. In addition, OneView marks the transformation of our technology to a web services framework, which provides open interface standards that allow for greater integration between Atex and non-Atex systems. At WAN-IFRA, we also showed our new OneView Audience platform, which is our next generation circulation management and audience development solution. Combined with our Advertising product, OneView gives user a single-view and a single point of access to all customer information – which includes advertisers, agencies, subscribers, readers, news agents, contributors, bloggers, and members of online communities.

DTI/Steve Nilan: We hear three common questions from prospective customers – not counting “how much does it cost?”:

1. What are the benefits and trade-offs of moving to your Cloud publishing model?

2. How do you automate or integrate work flows for digital and print content?

3. How are your current customers succeeding with your mobile and tablet solutions?

WAN-IFRA: How do your solutions help newspaper publishers either make money or save money?

Atex/Peter Marsh: With our OneView solutions, total cost of ownership is dramatically reduced because of the thin client footprint and lightweight hardware/software environment needed to operate the Atex systems. This means that publishers save money through the reduction of operating expenses. OneView also facilitates the move to a hosted environment, which is becoming increasingly popular among our publishing clients. By moving their systems to a hosted, off-premise model under the Atex Cloud managed services program, publishers are able to focus on their core competencies while entrusting Atex to the management and support of their IT platforms. On the editorial side, in 2012 Atex has deployed our fully integrated print and digital content management solution at numerous media companies around the world. The Atex Content platform enables digital-first business models, which allow publishers to deliver content to web, mobile and tablet platforms on a more immediate, more engaging, and more monetizable basis. The New York Daily News, for example, has seen average time-on-site for its website increase by a factor of four since going live on the Atex Content platform. Group Espresso in Italy has increased website traffic by more than 40 percent since the launch of the Atex digital-first content platform. Greater web traffic and site stickiness leads to new opportunities for growing digital advertising revenues, which has certainly been the case among our global customers. We think this is one of the truly unique value propositions that Atex has to offer. By providing an integrated solution that enables publishers to manage their advertising, audience and content, Atex is able to help create what we call a “virtuous circle of engagement” between these three pillars of a media company’s business. Advertisers do not pay to reach content. They pay to reach audience. If a publisher’s content doesn’t find and engage with its audience, the value of this content cannot increase. Therefore, publishers will not be able to monetize it. So, although a lot of companies at WAN-IFRA talk about “digital first,” at Atex we believe that the biggest opportunity in Digital First is not about improving content management and workflow. Instead, it’s about what we call “audience first” – driving demand and building audiences across all digital media channels.

DTI/Steve Nilan: Our strategy consists of delivering measurable business benefits in three categories: Digital audience engagement, Digital revenue expansion and Digital cost performance. Here are some of the ways our customers are making more money with our solutions:

1. Getting paid for digital content and keeping 100 percent of the new revenue with our Digital Paymeter software.

2. Creating and selling access to combo packages of digital and print products with DTI Circulation.

3. Creating new vertical products and ePaper editions for mobile and tablet  with DTI ContentPublisher.