Google Nearing TV Ad Deal With DirecTV

By Ed Oswald | Published April 11, 2007, 12:54 PM

Google may be close to snagging a second distributor for ads sold through its recently-announced television advertising program, with blog VentureBeat reporting that it may be about to sign a deal with satellite provider DirecTV.

Such a deal would give the Mountain View, Calif. a decent base from which to build on. Along with DISH Network, which it signed a deal with last week, Google would be able to offer its customers a potential reach of nearly 29 million television viewers.

Citing an unnamed source, VentureBeat says the deal will take a little more time to go through due to the fact the company recently changed management. However, it said a deal is all but certain.

"This is just the latest move by Google to sew up the entire advertising world," Matt Marshall wrote Tuesday. "Google is pushing into newspapers, magazines, radio, cable and now satellite."

Neither DirecTV nor Google would comment directly on the news, although it said it is always pursuing new opportunities to grow its advertising business.

In any case, the news is good for DirecTV, and shows some television operators may be more open to Google's ambitions than those in radio. The company has struggled to build up its business there.

Its radio ad efforts have only seen about 900 stations in about 200 markets sign up to be part of the program, most of which are outside major markets and operate at low power.