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How do newspaper ad reps spell relief? I-N-T E-R-N-E T: Do-it-yourself plans for advertisers make debut at Nexpo
IN A SERVICE ECONOMY THAT HAS CUSTOMERS PUMP THEIR own gas, do their banking at machines, and clean up their own tables at McDonald's, it was probably inevitable that newspapers would start asking advertisers to create their own ads.
At the recent Nexpo in San Francisco, several companies unveiled Web-based services that allow papers to make just that demand. Besides asking advertisers to do the traditional work of salespeople and telephone ad takers, the services have two things in common: They use the ubiquitous Internet to replace the expense and technological hassle of the previous generation of direct computer or ISDN links between a paper and advertisers, and they permit ads to go immediately...