They may have found a model that works for them with paid viewing options for their sports offerings, especially as we enter into March Madness.

CBS offers March Madness on Demand, an online viewing service that is free for users but managed to bring in $32 million in ad revenue in 2009 and projects a 20% growth in that number for 2010. It’s not as good as the numbers for SuperBowl, which brought CBS $200 million in ad revenue, but it’s also not shabby when you consider the relatively slim number of people who prefer watching their sports online.

Other networks are going with a paid option for their viewers, often with a series of packages that let users choose which sports they want to watch. The NBA went from a single streaming option to a number of standalone packages, and Major League Baseball has been using MLB.tv as a pay model since it launched in 2003. Subscription revenues there bring in $88 million.

Networks are getting more creative with iPhone apps as well, but no matter how they choose to make profit from their online offerings, they seem to no longer be attempting to resist the drift online. Now they’re simply learning to monetize that drift – and it seems to be working well for them.

In the past two years, NBC has been hosting their own smaller version of the presentation practice, inviting only a few to see their fall lineup in an “infront.” Looks like the network is abandoning its practice this year as they try to recover from several missteps and maintain a strong viewership.

The network is planning on overhauling its evening schedule, in part because of the embarrassing way they handled Jay Leno’s shift to his own talk show and then back again to the Tonight Show, ousting Conan O’Brien from the hosting spot and causing a surge of extremely negative feedback against the network.

The Tonight Show appears to have recovered more or less with 5.6 million viewers on Leno’s return episode, but it’s touch and go as to whether the entire network will follow.

NBC’s current viewer-bringing shows are “Parenthood” and “The Marriage Ref,” but they’re building a new lineup of a reported 20 pilot episodes for possible new shows. They need a hit new show, preferably one that both draws a huge viewership and earns critical acclaim, and at the moment, it’s not at all clear that they have that magic ratings-booster.

In a word of good news, the Olympics coverage from NBC may have helped it shift public perception back toward positive – though it still lags behind other networks including CBS, Fox, and ABC.

Simon Properties Group, currently the largest national shopping mall owner, has put in a bid to acquire General Growth Properties Inc., which is in Chapter 11 and struggling to emerge from bankruptcy. The proposed price is $9 a share, which, General Growth says, is not enough to get the company out of Chapter 11.

However, if the bid proves acceptable or Simon Properties improves its bid, the implications for national shopping malls will surely alter the status quo. The combined companies’ malls make up one third of the national market, and almost half of the best performing malls.

With a single landlord controlling this number of properties, retailers are concerned that the company will have far too much influence when it comes to dictating leases and rental prices. They’re also concerned about possible negotiations to open new locations in less-than-lucrative malls. It’s in Simon Properties’ best interest to improve the foot traffic to its low-performing malls, which they can achieve by opening a popular store like a Gap to encourage more people to visit.

Retail stores, however, naturally don’t want the expense of running a store in a low-traffic area, which means that Simon’s influence as landlord may prove detrimental to them.

The deal is still in the works, but we’ll be keeping an eye out for a changing mall landscape.

About the author:
Peter Koeppel – Founder and President of Koeppel Direct, a leader in DRTV (Direct Response Television),  radio, print and online media buying, marketing and campaign management.

Bad numbers may have meant that an already-flagging media format was going to have even more trouble getting advertisers to buy space on their shows, at a time when major companies are already pulling out in droves at the last minute if they fear their spots won’t reach a large enough number of viewers.

New shows that did well on ABC include Courteney Cox’s show Cougar Town and FlashForward; there may also be significant strength behind the critically acclaimed comedy Modern Family. On the CW, there’s a new show cashing in on the vampire obsession sweeping the United States called The Vampire Diaries which held onto a whopping 100% of its debut audience and grew from week to week.

Returning shows with good ratings include House, with a 6.5 rating in the 18-49 demographic, The Big Bang Theory, and NCIS. Fox also did extremely well with its return for House, with a 6.5 rating for their 18-49 demographic.

In the less-cheerful news, several returning series that have previously shown good numbers may be on their way out, with Community and The Office loosing significant viewers and ratings points, as well as Law & Order: SVU, CSI, and CSI: Miami showing lower numbers than expected. Heroes looks to be a dead show walking, and Dancing with Stars was down a frightening 24% from last fall’s debut, with the least-watched premiere yet in its 9 seasons at only 17.5 million viewers.

A few other shows are simply holding steady, including The Mentalist, Grey’s Anatomy, and The Jay Leno Show, all of whom are competing for the same Thursday time slot. It’s not a great turnout for broadcast, but it’s not the last trump either.

Sales had fallen 5.1% among retailers, not including the industry giant Wal-Mart, which recently stopped releasing monthly figures. Consumers are cutting back on non-essentials, which means that traditional activities like buying new clothes for back-to-school might be put off for months or even another year, as parents try to get back their financial footing.

Teen retailers saw the hardest hit, especially clothing stores. One reason why goes like this: Because teens have often already “hit their growth spurt,” they don’t always want new clothes because they need them size-wise, but because they want something newer and “cooler.”

This may explain why the uber-fashionable and expensive stores took the hardest hits – Abercrombie & Fitch Co. dropped by 28% – while discounted name-brand merchandise available at TJ Maxx has actually seen an uptick of 2.3%.

Department stores are also having a rough time selling back-to-school clothes, supplies, dorm furniture, and the like. J.C. Penney reported a 12.3% decline and Macy’s dropped 10.7%, while Target, with cheaper alternatives to similar products, still saw a decline of 6.5%.

A correlated problem is that retailers are cutting back on their staff, which means back-to-school teens and college students are having trouble finding work. No work means no discretionary income for that new back-to-school outfit or the little extras like a better laundry basket.

For right now, buyers are making do with what they’ve got.

Why not cars indeed. Mostly, the haggling has been what limits car’s availability online. Buyers know they can often get a better price by speaking with the dealer and engaging in some serious negotiation, and they’re not willing to pay sticker price. The idea of buying a vehicle for its given price is laughable, yet that seemed to be the only way to buy a car online – offer a price, put it in your shopping cart, and check out.

With a new joint venture by GM and eBay, buyers can get the convenience of online shopping without losing the benefits of haggling with their dealer. The pilot program, which is currently only available in California, allows shoppers to browse through 20,000 vehicles from the state’s 250 GM dealers, does have the option to allow the consumer to buy the car for sticker price, but it also features a way to bargain with their car dealer – online.

Though used cars have been available for purchase on eBay for years, this is the first program sanctioned to sell new cars from certified dealers. Dealers are motivated to participate because it can give them access to a wider customer base than the ones who simply know the local dealership, and of course customers have a better chance of finding the deal they’re looking for with more competition.

It’s a great new way to buy a car, but the ones who might be getting the best deal are GM and eBay.

The more closely an advertiser can tailor their ad to a specific demographic, the more likely they are to make the sale or get the click. While it seems merely useful for advertisers – and in some cases, indispensible – many users are starting to become seriously uncomfortable with the idea that their movements, on and offline, are being observed and recorded.

A surprising amount of offline data is currently referenced to online activity, meaning that public records can be mixed up with a browsing history to create a spot-on diagnostic for the type of person who is currently using the computer.

Advertising research has compiled data that includes everything from birth and bridal registries to warranties to licenses – all with the aim of providing appropriate advertising to that person. However, when targeted advertising becomes almost eerily spot-on, consumers begin to wonder whether the advertisers’ interests are really so benign.

One of the primary focuses of the complaints about privacy is Acxiom, which cross-references a plethora of information to find the exact consumers their advertising interests are looking for. For example, an advertiser might ask them to find the names and addresses of single mothers above a certain income bracket, whose children would soon be going to high school and who did not currently own a car.

That’s very specific. But it’s not an uncommon level of specificity. So far, privacy online is not regulated, and advertising industries argue that no such regulation is necessary. Consumers are increasingly unsure – and unhappy.

The two major companies joined forces with a 10-year agreement to work on their web search technology together in hopes of rivaling the far-ahead market leader Google. The advertising expertise of Yahoo and the search engine research of Microsoft should make a fairly potent – if not game-ending – combination, but others are skeptical.

Investor shares dropped 12%, showing the disappointment many felt that Yahoo was not to receive any up-front payments, in addition to lower revenue-sharing and cost-savings agreements than had previously been speculated. Microsoft investors seemed a little more enthusiastic about the deal, closing at 1.4% up. Google dropped slightly, but not enough to raise any eyebrows – a scant 0.8%.

Even now, the deal hasn’t been fully implemented. It could take up to two and a half years to get approval and pass antitrust and privacy regulations.

Yahoo had previously attempted a merger with Google, which was dropped for antitrust and privacy reasons after the U.S. Justice Department began to look into it. The Obama administration may look more kindly on this merger to create competition for Google, but that theory is yet to be tested.

That’s a lot of obstacles for the merger to get through, but they may yet rival Google in years to come if they can manage it. All there is left to do is wait and see – and search online for updates.

With 35% of cable subscribers who also watch video online thinking of cutting their cable subscription, the threat to major media companies like Time Warner, Viacom and NBC Universal has become very real.

The majority of profits for these companies currently come from cable programming. The concern is that cable programming online will completely erode the significant fees they garner from their subscribers – fees that are currently keeping major entertainment companies afloat.

On the other hand, as more network television shows up online, and the ever-present threat of regular consumers uploading copyrighted material on video-sharing services like YouTube, cable networks could get left in the dust if they don’t get online with all the other shows.

One idea that’s garnered some interest among the cable companies is going ahead with putting cable shows online – but in order to view them, consumers must first prove that they are a cable subscriber. This gives their customers the convenience of viewing their favorite programs anytime they want from their computers, while still ensuring that everyone who views the material has paid for the privilege.

Cable networks are trying to set up a standard cable-viewing policy across the board, worrying that if some shows are available for free (as many of Comedy Central’s shows currently are on Hulu) while others are restricted to cable subscribers only, they will not have managed the problem in the best way possible.

Consumers clicking on online ads in the UK and the US have been getting malware on their computers, and the pushback is not going to be pretty.

Since hackers look for places to put their malware that attract large numbers of people, internet ads are an obvious place for them to insert their viruses. Extremely popular ads, particularly ones that involve clicking on a link, are an excellent agent to distribute their malware to the general public.

Risks include consumers becoming angry at the companies who put up these ads, even if the companies themselves have nothing to do with the malware and do not have a hacker among their own employees.

This means that companies who want to spend their advertising dollars online would be well advised to invest a portion of those funds in serious security systems to protect their customers – and their own ROI.