Reach and Reach partner for much bigger reach

October 21, 2011 by Dave Haynes

It’s not entirely clear whether this would make the Confuse-O-Meter purr or burst into flames, but Reach Media Group has done a sales representation deal with Reach Sports Marketing Group, the former selling media inventory on the latter’s digital out of home fitness network.

It’s maybe not all that confusing because RMG Networks is the name being actively marketed by the San Francisco-based company. And agencies and brands that might have been confused between the two, will now have just one sales guy showing  the combined set of pots and pans.

The deal sees RMG bundling its own fitness network assets with the clubs that have screens operated by Twin Cities-based Reach, resulting in a combined network that hits 900 facilities and 17 million monthly viewers. The increased scale and scope also allows RMG to put an offer in front of brands to target messaging by DMA.

“Advertisers have repeatedly asked for a health club media product that could be targeted regionally or by DMA and this partnership allows us to provide that,” says David Bruce, EVP, Media Products and Partnerships for RMG Networks, in the news release.

The Reach guy, in that release, says he’s excited. Twice. In one sentence.

Wheee!

Anyway, there is a nice fit here in that both networks do full sight, sound and motion programming, which makes selling and managing much easier when networks are blended. Reach is installed in Lifetime Fitness Centers, Ys, some colleges and a lot of recreation complexes.

RMG’s Fitness Entertainment Network defines its offer as delivering broadcast advertising units within live cable television shown in the cardio areas of health clubs across the U.S.

RMG continues to grow through both acquisition and partnerships, like this, that get the footprint bigger without all the capital expenses. RMG now has or controls 130,000 screens, and says it is delivering 58 million monthly viewers across six networks.

As noted in the past, you will see more and more of this as networks accept that they either have to invest big money to build to scale (and somehow find investors to bankroll that) or get big through collaboration and/or acquisition. Combining sales also tends to reduce the cost of sale.