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In the battle for ATM advertising, fragmentation is the enemy. National advertisers typically won't sign on the dotted line unless they can get the right kind of locations, in the right numbers. The highly fragmented ISO market has struggled to fill advertisers' needs -- and more often than not, come up short. With an installed base of approximately 40,000 off-premise ATMs in the U.S., Triton Systems believes it can help "de-fragment" the independent market. To that end, Triton has formed a joint marketing alliance with Secora, a St. Louis-based ATM advertising company. The Long Beach, Miss.-based manufacturer is encouraging its 50 or so U.S. distributors to work with Secora, combining their machines to create a kind of "master network" in hopes of attracting high-profile advertisers. Many of them got a chance to meet Secora at Triton's third annual Worldwide Distributor's Conference in Biloxi, Miss., last week. Triton considered creating an internal advertising division, as some other ATM manufacturers have done. But the company determined it would lose too much time and momentum by doing so -- and instead began reviewing the resumes of several ATM advertising companies. "We were impressed by the progress made by some of these third parties," said Ken Paull, Triton's vice president of sales and marketing. "We decided it made the most sense to partner with someone who was totally focused on advertising." Secora stood out because of a string of previous successes, Paull said. The company helped San Diego-based XtraCash ATM create a campaign for southern California McDonald's restaurants. A more recent promotion for Half.com ran on KeyBank ATMs at am/pm convenience stores in several Western states. With an in-house design team, Secora can create, develop, deliver and manage advertising content. "They do all of the creative work, from soup to nuts," Paull said, noting that ISOs can choose to use all or just some of the company's services. David Moritz, president of Secora, said Triton's strong distribution network and dominance in the off-site market could help put ATM advertising over the top. "This media is more focused on the off-premise market, and Triton is the one you want to go to in the off-premise world." Challenges remain, of course. One of the biggest sticking points is how revenue should be divided up among participants. And just how much revenue can an ATM deployer expect? "If you ask 150 people, you'll get 150 different answers regarding revenue expectations," Moritz said. Triton signed on with Secora even though the St. Louis company already had a partnership with NCR, a Triton rival. Though ATM manufacturers normally tread a highly proprietary path, Paull believes a broader view must prevail if ATM advertising is to succeed. "We became a little less selfish. I think others will need to do the same," he said. "If we each join together, our proportion of the pie might be smaller but that will be more than offset by the increase in the size of the overall pie." Moritz agreed that a multi-vendor strategy is key to the mainstream acceptance of ATM advertising. "The manufacturers are where is has to start. If they don't get behind this, then it won't work." While other ATM advertising companies have established relationships with manufacturers, Secora has licensing rights to both Triton's Triton Connect and NCR's RAC (Remote Access Control) software. These programs allow deployers to remotely download ads into their ATMs. One of Secora's first tasks is to create a database of Triton distributors, with a worksheet for each machine detailing location, configuration and other relevant information. "If you get 700 ATMs from one guy, and 300 from another, and 1,000 from another -- before you know it, you have critical mass," Moritz said. Machines won't be included "unless we can connect to it and send a graphic to it," Moritz explained, noting that inflated numbers have been an all-too-common problem in the ATM advertising arena. While several networks may be tapped for an advertising campaign, Moritz stressed that Secora realizes that confidentiality is a must in the extremely competitive ISO world. Only Secora will have access to the overall database. Triton plans to offer incentives for distributors who register their sites with Secora. Advertising-friendly field upgrades -- such as speedier modems and color screens -- will be offered at prices similar to factory orders. According to Paull, this would normally amount to at least a 50 percent discount. And Paull is convinced that early adopters will reap other financial benefits. "There are a lot of sales and operational lessons to be learned in this process. I believe that, just like cash dispensing, those that get these strategies in hand faster will have a competitive advantage in the market," he said. "If one ISO can offer an ad program this week and another takes six months to offer this revenue stream to a retailer, there will be a difference in their abilities to compete."