China Central Television (CCTV), the mainland's largest broadcaster, is expected to boost income from its annual auction of advertising airtime slots at least 10 per cent to 5.8 billion yuan next month compared with last year.
The company operates under a full market mechanism by selling airtime to advertisers to fund its competition with provincial television channels such as Hunan Satellite Television, the producer of the mainland's hottest variety show, Super Girl Voice.
For the first time, CCTV will be offering advertisers a cross-media deal that includes traditional television airtime, the CCTV.com website and the China Television Daily newspaper.
'We do want to help our clients build up their branding in a three-dimensional way,' Hongbo Xia, director of the CCTV advertising department, said in an interview published on CCTV.com.
'While we can deliver the message across the nation through our television channels, by using CCTV.com, we can let our audience directly interact with brands.'
Mr Xia said the new strategy will help advertisers build their brands before the 2008 Beijing Olympics.