OREANDA-NEWS. November 27, 2009. At press conference, ProfMedia Broadcasting Corporation (PMBC) and Russian MediaGroup (RMG) officially announced the creation of a united sales unit that will work on selling advertising opportunities for both large broadcasting holdings.

Without exception all contracts for placing capital and network advertisements, as well as all contracts for multi-location placement on radio stations of both holdings planned for 2010 and beyond will be henceforth concluded with the unified sales unit OOO Radio Alliance.

RMG and PMBC already have experience of successful cooperation – in March 2009 they launched the project ‘Radio Alliance. Everything’s included’, which partially united advertising sales for the two holdings’ radio stations. The package offered by Radio Alliance at the beginning of 2009 was able to offer the advantages of an attractive, working marketing instrument. The project offered the opportunity to place advertisements simultaneously on all Alliance radio stations on one scale of charges and a unified media-plan within the framework of one hourly interval.

The success of this experience leads them to make the decision to create a sales unit of the same name, which would unite the commercial services of RMG and PMBC.

It is expected that Radio Alliance will become a strategically valuable partner and one of the largest and most influential players on the market. The unified sales unit will provide the chance to strategically place advertising on all RMG radio stations (Russkoye Radio, HIT FM, DFM, RSN, Dobrie Pesni, Radio Monte-Carlo, and Radio MAXIMUM) and PMBC stations (Avtoradio, Radio ENERGY, Humour FM, and Radio Alla), as well as the long-term development and consolidation of regional sales, a unified pricing policy, and control and monitoring of network advertising.

The development of this type of structure, which comprises the strongest radio stations, is a big step forward in the development of sales systems for advertising resources on the Russian market.

“The creation of such a large player on the advertising market allows us to increase radio’s share of the advertising budget, creates a unique new advertising platform, optimizes communications with advertising agencies, improves the transparency of operations for PMBC and RMG shareholders, create new jobs, and allow us to attract the best sales specialists to the radio broadcasting field,” said Alexandr Varin, president of PMBC and the Russian Academy of Radio, at the press conference.

According to RMG CEO Sergey Kozhevnikov, “in Russia radio simply doesn’t get the big budgets. Radio’s share amounts to a very small part of advertising budgets in Russia (4-5%), which does not match radio’s usual position in an international context (8-9%). We remain competitive on the media market, but on the sales market we have the chance to unite and capture a better position. The trend in recent years has been to consolidate single stations into radio holdings, and now the time has come to create sales units.”

The radio stations of RMG and PMBC are in the top ten based on daily audience numbers in Moscow and in the Russian regions. Russkoye Radio and Avtoradio hold leading positions on daily reach in Moscow and in many Russian cities.

The sales unit will be audited according to international standards. Radio Alliance offices are located at 12, 3ya Khoroshevskaya ul., Moscow. There are 240 employees.

Oleg Ostashevsky, who previously held the position of PMBC vice president for client relations, has been named head of the new structure.

The Radio Alliance includes eight of the top twenty Moscow radio stations (Russkoye Radio, Avtoradio, Humour FM, Radio ENERGY, DFM, HIT FM, Radio Alla, and RSN), as well as five of sixteen network radio stations (Russkoye Radio, Avtoradio, Humour FM, DFM, and HIT FM) with coverage of more than 80% of the Russian population.

This unification will allow the Alliance to take a dominant share not only of the radio market as a whole, but also of any target group.

According to data from the TNS market research company, Radio Alliance will control about 34% of the Moscow and network advertising on radio, and the company’s share of the total advertising market in Russia will amount to 1.26%.

“Basically we’re talking about creating a serious advertising platform, which will allow us to place advertising for practically any product or service, work with any advertiser, and will be convenient for both direct clients and for advertising agencies,” said Oleg Ostashevsky.