CBS SportsLine had its strongest month ever in terms of Internet traffic in March, according to Nielsen//NetRatings.
A major catalyst for traffic in March was CBS SportsLine's NCAA March Madness on Demand (MMOD), produced in partnership with CBS Sports, CSTV and the NCAA. MMOD provided streaming live video of the first 56 games of the 2006 NCAA Division I Men's Basketball Championship and was offered free of charge.
Final NCAA MMOD traffic numbers show:
- MMOD served more than 19 million streams of live and archived game action
- MMOD recorded more than 5 million visits during the tournament
- 1.3 million users registered for MMOD
The CBS SportsLine.com Network, a compilation of CBS-owned and -produced sites, includes CBS SportsLine.com, CSTV.com, NCAAsports.com and PGATOUR.com, registered 15.4 million unique visitors in March. Taking into account the addition of CSTV.com, the CBS SportsLine.com Network traffic figure is up 94 percent from 2005. CBS acquired CSTV Networks in January.
CBS SportsLine.com led the way with nearly 8 million unique visitors, its highest monthly total ever and 50 percent higher than in 2005.
On the heels of MMOD, CBS Digital Media was involved in another highly successful online live video event. Masters.org partnered with CBS SportsLine, CBS Sports and Augusta National Golf Club to produce "Amen Corner Live," live streaming video from the 11th, 12th and 13th holes of the 2006 Masters Tournament. Traffic numbers for the "Amen Corner Live" were:
- More than 3.4 million video streams of live golf action
- A peak usage figure of more than 85,000 simultaneous streams
- The average time spent viewing "Amen Corner Live" was more than two hours per visit.
