Publishing giant attracts subscribers, buyers with SAS® Business Intelligence

While the editorial offices of Berliner Verlag, the leading publisher in Germany's capital, fill their pages with political, economic, cultural and sports news every day, the marketing and distribution departments are busy promoting publications to millions of readers. Success of the various marketing campaigns, measured through varying circulation statistics, determines what approach the publisher will take for future promotions.

Berliner Verlag looks to SAS to provide high-quality and transparent reporting of critical circulation information, allowing marketing and distribution to manage the data in half the time formerly spent on culling reports. What's more, the self-service SAS interface allows management to receive current, cumulative results at the right time in the right format.

The publisher's periodicals span daily newspapers like Berliner Zeitung and Berliner Kurier; Berlin's largest magazine, Tip Berlin; weekly magazine Berliner Abendblatt; and borough-specific titles like Warnow Kurier and Berliner Rathausnachrichten. With such a variety of publications, mailing campaigns and promotions undergo lengthy evaluation to ensure they continue to appeal to potential subscribers and buyers. Marketers closely monitor circulation data to measure the success of campaigns, looking at questions such as:

• How many copies have been sold or distributed?
• How are regional sales distributed, and how high is the return rate?
• How has circulation developed as compared to the same period a year ago?

 
Based on this data, marketing specialists can see whether their activity yielded the desired result – and adjust their approach, if necessary.
In the past, Berliner Verlag did this type of internal reporting using a combination of Excel tables and SQL queries, all of which lacked transparency.

"Our former process had evolved over the years and was quite cumbersome," explains Moritz Fischer from the Database Management Department at Berliner Verlag. "We were looking for a new solution that would yield comparable or better results with less effort. Also, our old system wasn't very transparent. Tracking the programming logic was difficult."

Quick and efficient BI with a familiar face
SAS has helped Berliner Verlag take its internal reporting to a new level. Before SAS, the publisher consolidated Excel tables manually to calculate parameters. Now, the process is much more efficient through weekly automated reporting. SAS uses data from two Oracle databases – Excel tables and text files – and integrates, consolidates and processes it into reports for each SAS user group. For example, the publisher's management receives concise PowerPoint slides on current circulation trends, automatically populated by SAS.

For employees in the technical departments, SAS provides reports in different data formats, such as HTML, PDF or Excel tables. In this way, the experts can use all of the SAS functionalities in a familiar Excel environment.

"For example, they can find answers to specific questions using pivot tables, compare Tuesdays to Tuesdays, or third weeks to third weeks," explains Fischer. The previous solution did not provide this simplicity or flexibility – and the feedback from users has been very positive.

The Database Management Department is also very happy with the new SAS solution because it has made reporting faster and more transparent.

"Today, preparing and creating reports takes 50 percent of the time it used to," says Fischer.

In addition to weekly standard reports, Berliner Verlag creates ad hoc reports on specific questions quickly and easily. "This is another area where we benefit from SAS," says Fischer. "Since it is very user-friendly, new evaluations can be created effortlessly and within a very short period of time. We can easily build analysis and reporting process chains. Each process becomes traceable and transparent because the steps are visually represented automatically. That is another big step forward compared to our former solution."

Consequently, Fischer is convinced, "With this solution, we have achieved all the goals we had envisioned."

SAS® is just right for a medium-sized company
The guiding principle for Berliner Verlag when beginning its search for a partner was to find a real business solution rather than following a tool-driven approach. After some preliminary research, the quotes from four suppliers reached the final evaluation stage: SAP/Business Objects, IBM/Cognos, MicroStrategy – and SAS.

Fischer and his colleagues from the Database Management Department were unanimous in their decision. "The bottom line was, SAS is the solution with the best performance and the most transparent structure," explains Fischer. "It allows us to optimally represent our processes."

Guido Köglsperger, Berliner Verlag's Database Management/Database Marketing Department Manager, adds, "In addition, we were impressed by SAS' pricing structure. SAS precisely meets the requirements of a medium-size company like ours."

SAS installation and implementation led to the desired results – swiftly and without problems. This was due an initial analysis of existing and additionally requested reporting structures.

"Taking sufficient time for planning in advance is essential," suggests Fischer. "Not just the overall direction, but also important milestones need to be defined."

The prepared process flows were then introduced into the system via SAS. The intuitive simplicity of the user solution required minimal training. Five months after project launch, the new solution went live – and has since been running to the full satisfaction of all participants.

But that does not keep Fischer from thinking about expansion. "Our next step is distributing the reports via a Web portal – but even then, we will continue working on refining our reporting processes. And with SAS, we have the best prerequisites for doing so."

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