MTV Music Inks Online Video Ad Deal With Warner Music Group

Warner Music Group (WMG) and MTV Networks have inked a non-exclusive deal that gives MTV Music exclusive rights to sell ads around thousands of music videos on the sites of Warner artists, third party affiliate sites, and MTV Music Group digital properties.

The multi-year deal also calls for MTV and WMG to work together to sell advertising on WMG mobile applications and WAP sites and to identify sponsors for WMG artist tours and events. In addition, MTV will provide WMG labels such as Asylum, Atlantic, East West, Elektra, Sire, and Warner Bros with a range of ad sales services, including marketing, strategy and planning, pipeline management and reporting, and the management of agency relationships.

MTV Music Group president Van Toffler said the deal “offers advertisers one-stop shopping for the most comprehensive source of music programming. Our sales teams are ready to go out and connect clients with this valuable content.”

The partnership also gives MTV the opportunity use Warner artists to appear on the network or provide licensed music for its TV series, including “Jersey Shore” and “The Hard Times of RJ Berger.”

Prior to this deal, WMG worked with Outrigger Media to sell online ads around music videos. WMG noted Outrigger will continue to handle certain functions in the coming months. “Mike Henry and the team at Outrigger have done an outstanding job representing WMG and its artists and we look forward to working with Outrigger in a different capacity on new and targeted marketing programs,” said a statement from Lyor Cohen, CEO of WMG Recorded Music in the Americas and the U.K.

In addition to cementing the advertising reality that music videos are now an online rather than a TV play, this move gives MTV Music ammunition as it looks to compete for music video-related ad dollars with YouTube and Vevo, which has lined up the support the music industry heavyweights such as Universal Music Group, Sony and EMI.

MTV recently reported a 68 percent year-over-year rise in unique visitors to its online properties. But according to May comScore findings, Vevo tops all of MTV parent company Viacom in terms of total videos viewed, with 430 million users to Viacom’s 346 million. Both of those trail leader Google, which had more than 14.6 billion videos viewed on its sites during the month.