The Gospel Music Channel has signed an exclusive advertising sales representation agreement with multiplatform advertising sales firm WorldLink.
Los Angeles-based WorldLink will manage all short-form direct response advertising sales for the Gospel Music Channel, which has almost 20 million subscribers in the United States.
“[Our viewers] are passionate gospel fans and very engaged with the channel, but they’re also incredibly influential,” said
Barbara Bekkedahl, vice president of advertising sales at the Gospel Music Channel.
The 24-hour, all-music-television entertainment network reaches a primarily female and African-American audience in the 18-to-49 and 25-to-54 age demographic.
“We just conducted some custom research,” Bekkedahl continued, “and learned our viewers are not only incredibly satisfied with our channel but they’re also very influential in their larger social circles.”
The Gospel Music Channel recently solidified its sub-base at 17 million households, according to Bekkedahl. It also picked up the subscribers from the Black Family Channel, which recently went off the air.
Bekkedahl believes the deal with WorldLink should bring about “revenue growth that’s commensurate with the network’s growth.”
Toni Knight, president/CEO of WorldLink, spoke well of the partnership.
“[The Gospel Music Channel has] got good distribution, terrific programming and they’re really going to be growing.
It’ll be a unique programming environment for our advertisers,” she said.
