Radio traffic software: what it does, and how to choose

Cartwright radio traffic software is made for the small local station, where traffic, billing and sales are often the same person. This page explains the category first, including when you don't need it, and gets to Cartwright after.

What does radio traffic software do?

Traffic software is the paperwork between a sale and an invoice. It turns what was sold into a schedule the automation system can play, then checks what actually aired so the station bills for that and nothing else.

The chain runs the same way at every station, whatever the size:

1. Sale. An advertiser agrees to a campaign: how many spots, which weeks, which parts of the day, at what rate.
2. Order. The sale becomes an order, with flights for the dates it runs and dayparts for the hours it may air in.
3. Log. Each day's spots are placed into breaks, following the station's clocks, and written out as that day's traffic log.
4. Automation. The log goes to the automation system, which merges it into the day's playlist and plays the spots.
5. As-run. After the day airs, the automation's play history says what really went out, and when.
6. Reconcile. The as-run is matched against the log. Spots that aired are proven; spots that didn't are flagged.
7. Invoice. The advertiser is billed from what reconciled, and anything missed is owed back as a makegood.

Steps one to four put a spot on the air. Steps five to seven are what make the bill honest, and they are the ones a spreadsheet quietly skips.

What should you judge traffic software on?

Feature lists all look alike. These are the questions that separate one system from another once it is running at your station.

• Does it work with your automation system? The log has to arrive in the format your automation imports, in the folder it watches, before it needs it. Ask how the as-run comes back, too: delivery is only half the connection.
• Does it bill from what aired? Some setups invoice straight from the schedule, which assumes everything ran. Look for one that reconciles the as-run first and builds the invoice from the result.
• What happens when a spot doesn't run? A missed spot should become a makegood the station owes, visible until it is paid back on air. The failure to watch for is a missed spot billed anyway because nothing flagged it.
• Where does it run? Software on a machine at the station keeps working when the internet doesn't, and advertiser records stay in the building. A hosted service means nothing to look after on site, but log delivery then depends on a connection and on somebody else's servers.
• How is it priced? Per-seat pricing charges you for adding a sales rep; module pricing charges separately for billing or a CRM. One price for everything keeps the monthly number predictable, which matters more at a small station than a big one.
• Can one person run it? At a small station, traffic is somebody's second or third job. If building a day's log takes a trained specialist, it won't get built on the days that person is out.

Does a small station need traffic software at all?

Not always. A station with a handful of sponsors, the same spots every week, and one person who knows the schedule by heart can do fine with a spreadsheet and the automation system's own tools.

The signs that it has stopped working are specific:

• An advertiser asks whether their spot ran last Tuesday, and answering means digging through play history by hand.
• Invoices go out for what was scheduled rather than what aired, because checking takes too long.
• Missed spots are remembered, or not, instead of tracked until they are made good.
• The log only gets built when one particular person is in the building.

If none of that sounds familiar, keep the spreadsheet. When it starts to, that is the moment to look.

What does Cartwright do?

Cartwright is radio traffic, CRM and billing software for local stations, from Martian Creative, LLC. It is Windows software that installs on a computer at the station, and other computers on the station network use it in a web browser. Your data stays at the station; it is not a hosted service.

It is not an automation system and does not replace yours. It hands the day's log to your automation and reads the as-run back, and it never writes into the automation's own database.

• Traffic: orders, flights, dayparts and clocks; log generation and delivery to the automation; as-run reconciliation, makegoods owed back, and pacing.
• Billing: invoices built from what aired, and contracts with e-signature.
• CRM: pipeline, companies, contacts, leads and tasks, so the sale and the order live in the same place.
• Studio: show prep, liners, live reads and contests for the people on the air.

It works with StationPlaylist Creator and Studio, and the StationPlaylist page says exactly how. Running something else? Automation systems lists the four things any automation needs to offer.

To see the whole chain in the product, Getting a spot on air follows one spot from order to as-run, and Spots you owe back covers makegoods. The quick start is a ten-minute tour.

What it costs

One price per station, with every feature included: no seats and no modules. Monthly is $79 a month, and the annual plan costs two months less than paying monthly. The 30-day trial is free and needs no card.

Setup and training are free with your first subscription, by phone or screen share. When you call for help after that, you reach the people who build Cartwright, in California: no call center and no script.

Common questions