On Broadcast Case Study
The Challenge
On Broadcast - Media Booking and Contact Management. Users: Managers, Sales, Admin Staff, Accounts.
On Broadcast managed fast moving campaigns using Microsoft Access, Excel and manual copy and paste. Contacts were duplicated across files, call sheets went out of date quickly and producing distribution lists took too long. With TV, radio and online slots to coordinate, small admin errors could cost coverage.
The agency needed one system to plan events, manage broadcaster and journalist contacts, build call sheets and send press materials without rekeying. Data had to stay in sync in real time, with clear approvals, audit trails and professional email output.
The Development Process
Through a combination of on-site visits to their London based offices and remote Teams meetings we worked with producers, publicists and the ops team to map how campaigns are booked, contacts are sourced and call sheets are built.
From this we produced a detailed specification including screens, roles, workflows, data model and reporting, plus email and calendar integrations.
We prototyped all the major elements including job bags, event schedules, contact search, distribution list builder and call sheet layouts. Interactive clickable prototypes let the team confirm the usability and functionality before we built anything. We agreed import rules to clean historic contacts and remove duplicates.
Once development started we added a feedback reporting module, so when different features were ready for testing their team had an easy way to report their findings.
Towards the end of development it was realised that it would help them if an editor could be integrated to generate Word-compatible templates for press releases and pitches. This was duly added.
Data was migrated from their current data sources and standard formatting and validation applied. A staged rollout kept the team operational throughout.
Key features
- Event and job bag management with documents, notes and timelines
- Integrated call sheets that pull live data from the contact database
- Broadcaster and journalist management with regions, beats and preferences
- Distribution list builder with dedupe, opt-in checks and scheduled sends
- Seamless email output via Word templates or the built-in editor
- Multi-platform planning for TV, radio and online with status tracking
- Search and tagging for assets, links and coverage
- Audit trails, permissions and GDPR fields across contacts and sends
Outcome
The system was a great success has been in continuous use without issue and remains the agency’s operational hub. Campaign setup is faster, teams work from one contact list and call sheets update automatically. Errors are down, approvals are clearer and reporting is easier.
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