CBS Launches College Sports Vertical Ad Network

Hot off their CNET acquisition, CBS (CBS) is announcing the launch of a new vertical ad network. CBS will launch "CBS College Sports Media" today. The new ad network will include CBSSports.com, NCAA.com and over 200 official college sports sites. While CBS runs March Madness and the basketball game streaming, they will have to push the other 200 college sports sites to drive traffic higher to keep the network going year-round. The college sports sites are the official athletic sites of approximately 215 colleges which are currently operated by CBS College Sports Network.

The other big announcement is that the CBS sites in this new ad network will remove all ties to any remnant ad networks. These would most likely include: Advertising.com, Burst Media, Tribal Fusion, ValueClick, etc. Basically what they are telling sites in the college sports demographic is, "get in or get out." 

CBS stated that this new ad network would have reached 10 million unique visitors and 1.5 billion impressions in March 2008. It's important to note that March would most likely be their highest month of delivery with the college basketball tourney in the month of March.

Staci at PaidContent has more on the new ad network and believes the remnant network removal will be in the millions of dollars.