• by Wayne Friedman , March 10, 2006

CBS is not just seeing good advertising sales results from the NCAA Tournament, but from its roster of PGA golf events.

John Bogusz, president of CBS Sports sales, says all its golf events are ahead of pace this year--with about 90 percent inventory sold for the year. CBS has already run three tournaments this year and has another 13 to air this season. Bogusz said prices are up 'mid-single digits' over the year before.

CBS has seen growth for its PGA events from its financial services and technology advertisers.

Technology companies have also been especially helpful for its NCAA Tournament. Among the technology companies coming to the event are Microsoft Corp., which is returning after a two-year absence, and IBM and Cisco Systems, which are advertising for the first time.

The entire three-week NCAA tournament is about 95 percent sold out, he says, with CBS getting high-single-digit program price increases over last year's tournament.

CBS was admittedly concerned that the NCAA Tournament might have a big advertising problem reaching its sales goals--considering the other first-quarter big events. "I would be the first one to admit with the Super Bowl and the Winter Olympics, I was a little concerned if we could get home," said Bogusz.

Concerning the rest of the year, CBS' Bogusz says there are some challenges ahead. For the U.S. Open Tennis event, for example, he says, "we have a little work to do."

Next season will also be challenging because of new venues for NFL football--NBC "Sunday Night Football" package and to a lesser extent, the NFL Network Thursday-Saturday package of games.

The Sunday games on NBC are essentially that of ESPN's Sunday Night package. (ESPN will now broadcast "Monday Night Football"). The NFL Network package comes from siphoning off a couple of games from existing network packages.

All this would seemingly be a wash in terms of advertising supply and demand. But Bogusz says: "With NBC, it'll be more challenging. It's always challenging with new players."