DDB Group France

Nouveau Monde DDB à Lille in France, a division of DDB Worldwide Communications Group, is one of the world's leading advertising agencies. DDB has implemented WebProof as a service to their clients.

IT manager, Marc Bunas, for many years has been looking for a system which could manage their proofing jobs, as an alternative to traditional proofing where PDF documents are attached to e-mails and sent flying back and forth between the agency and several people at the client.

"We handle design, development, approval and production at a corporate level. We communicate daily with clients, and we have long-term print and prepress partners," says Marc Bunas. He continues, "To ensure a central overview, for both DDB and our clients, of all design, advertisements, folders, brochures, posters, displays, campaigns, etc., we found WebProof to be best-in-class".

Marc Bunas continues "Our large and often long communications process can get cumbersome. Imagine the quantity of e-mails, faxes, telephone calls and mail involved in a typical job, with its 5–6 proof stages. We have up to 30 pages to check every day (6,000 per year)". Marc shows a slide which explains the challenges of the communications process, when an agency such as DDB produces sales material. He continues, "As communication involves everyone – from designers, photographer, translation, product expertise, prepress, print, clients' internal marketing, and the respective countries – the time pressure can be extreme. As new products need to come onto the market quickly, we needed a control tool where all information would be stored centrally and yet be available to everyone. In other words, a collective forum to replace the individual's search for e-mails and time consuming telephone calls asking how far a job has come through the system."

"In our search for a simple, usable control tool I was, recommended to look at WebProof, amongst others. As soon as we saw the program we were impressed. It was simply tailor-made for DDB's graphic production", states Marc Bunas. In addition Marc adds, "We have checked WebProof and found it best-in-class. With the simple overview the software gives, and the ease with which information can be exchanged, there is no doubt that we get a very large time savings in the proof phase. As everything is collected in one place - page by page, and very easy to find - there is also a considerable reduction in errors and corrections".

"We can forget all about unreadable faxes and overflowing mailboxes with no usable function. We reduce production time and achieve a better cost structure for everybody involved. With WebProof, we can keep all material for a campaign in one place - everything from e-mails, to case stories, training material, displays and hand books," continues Marc Bunas.

"WebProof fills our needs better than anything else on the market. The price is very competitive and we did not have to invest in anything for our users - they just need access to the Internet. The Sticky Note messages, along with SMS and automatic e-mail functions, are super client services. With WebProof virtual control has become daily reality for DDB", sums up a very satisfied IT Manager, Marc Bunas.

Published August 15, 2008