• by Gavin O'Malley  @mp_gavin, March 12, 2008

To meet lofty revenue targets, CBSSports.com has nixed registration requirements to view its coverage of this year's NCAA college basketball tournament.

"This immediate, one-click access to the video player should greatly increase viewership, offering tremendous value to the over 30 advertisers," said Jason Kint, CBSSports.com senior vice president and general manager.

Those 30 advertisers include AT&T, Coca-Cola, Pontiac, DiGiorno, Enterprise, The Hartford, Lowe's, Sheraton and State Farm.

CBS's March Madness on Demand (MMOD) will be available at NCAA.com, as well as links on CBSSports.com, the CBS Audience Network, sites for CBS television and radio affiliates, along with YouTube, ESPN.com, Yahoo Sports, SI.com, and even Facebook.

Overall, CBS is expecting MMOD to generate over $21 million in revenue, CBS head Leslie Moonves said on an earnings call last month. That projection is up significantly from $9 million in 2007, and about $4 million in 2006.

During that call, Moonves described MMOD as the blueprint for the network's future distribution strategy. CBS's cross platform tournament coverage, for one, perfectly illustrates his belief that "internet audience is additive to our core audience."

"To this year's tournament, next month, we're projecting more than $21 million in total revenue," Moonves told analysts. "Meanwhile, our (TV) tournament ratings are as strong as ever, and our associated television revenues are growing."

CBS's ad-supported MMOD is all the more compelling, added Moonves, because its growth has required virtually no additional investment.

"Our costs remain exactly the same as they were the first year," Moonves said. "The great majority of that $21 million will drop to the bottom line, contributing to the hundreds of millions in interactive revenue across the company."

CBS this year is also experimenting with several add-ons to its MMOD coverage. For example, it enlisted the help of Facebook to host an NCAA March Madness Brackets application for the social network's 63 million active users to predict the tournament's winners and losers.

CBS's MMOD already requires cooperation between the NCAA and CBS Sports (CBS's television division), CBS SportsLine.com (CBS Digital's main sports property) and college sports site CSTV, which CBS acquired in 2006 for $325 million.

In 2006, MMOD surpassed all expectations by pulling in more than 19 million streams of live and archived game action. In addition, the service recorded over 5 million visits during the tournament, with a total of 1.3 million users registered.

That year, CBS's on-demand service replaced an existing subscription model, which required consumers to pay $19.99 for extensive tournament coverage.