In the middle of a tough advertising environment for most media, National Cable Communications (NCC) this week says it will announce plans to grow.

The nation's largest spot cable advertising representative firm will spend more than $10 million to increase its 450-person workforce by 17 and to develop and improve its e-business and billing software.

?This is the year we go on the offensive,? says Tom Olson, CEO of NCC since 1999. ?We think there's a huge upside.?

According to Olson, NCC has spent the last several years working to expand spot cable's share of a local television market traditionally dominated by broadcast. Local cable generated an estimated $3.1 billion in ad revenue in 2000, according to Kagan World Media, the databook and newsletter publisher that, like Cable World, is owned by Media Central. NCC revenues last year were approximately $450 million.

Before ad sales could expand, the cable industry needed to make spot cable easier to buy by forming interconnects, which allow advertisers to buy spots on systems throughout a market with a single order and by writing software that helps automate the ordering process.

According to NCC, the number of interconnects has jumped. At the end of 2001, 47 of the top 100 markets were served by interconnects, up from 19 at the beginning of the year.

The changes reflect a momentous shift in cable's advertising approach, according to Larry Fischer, NCC board member and Time Warner Cable EVP-local ad sales operations. The goal for cable now is ?presenting a united front in as many markets as possible. That's my mantra,? he says. In other words, cable should try to take ad dollars away from local broadcasters, rather than from other cable operators. ?I'm trying to put together interconnects wherever I can, and I think other operators are, too,? he says.

Such cooperation is fostered, in part, by the NCC, which is jointly owned by AT&T Media Services, Comcast Cable Communications, Cox Communications and Time Warner Cable; Katz Media Group, the largest ad rep firm in the U.S., is its managing partner.

Cable's traditional problems are no more, Fisher says. ?We don't oversell. We run the schedules we promise. We're ready to play with the big boys,? he says.

With grander deals in mind, NCC is hiring mostly sales executives. During 2001, 8.5% of NCC's revenues came from new business. Chuck Cowdrey, most recently in NCC's Cable Interconnects division, will become VP-sales, presiding over a newly created fifth region, based in Washington, D.C. Jim Beall, formerly of ad agency Cramer-Krasselt in Chicago, will be a marketing manager in Chicago; David Bird, former VP-marketing of 24/7 Media, will be a marketing manager in Dallas. Aaron Ashe, NCC's sales manager in Washington, D.C., for several years, will become political manager there, and the nationwide account executive tally will increase by 12.

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