A lot of brands, agencies and advertisers made promises in 2020 to further support Black businesses, creators and voices. Just a few weeks into 2021, publishers focused on those audiences see reasons to be optimistic.

This coming February, the Root will launch its first automotive ad campaign as part of G/O Media. The campaign, for Ford’s F-150, will run across G/O Media’s sites, but the Root will be at its centerpiece; the campaign, celebrating Black History Month, centers of moments of Black joy.

That campaign is just one of several that G/O has lined up for the Root around Black History Month, said Brian Kelly, G/O Media’s chief revenue officer, who was one of several media executives who said that this year, agency and brand RFPs around Black History Month are more numerous, for longer periods of time and larger dollar amounts than in years past.

“In general we’ve been very pleased with Q1 activity across the portfolio, but we’re especially proud of the Root and the interest in partnerships,” said Kelly. “I not even just through the RFP process, it’s brands actually reaching out and looking to align. It’s, ‘How can we collaborate, together?’”

Thanks to advertisers’ lingering preferences for doing deals closer to a campaign’s launch date, Kelly, like many other revenue leaders in media, said his team is still selling into February. But he expects to close Black History Month deals in categories including entertainment, social media and retail.

And like many of his peers, Kelly is hoping to use that interest as a springboard for conversations about longer deals. “February is an incredibly important time of year for the brand, but this is a 365-day-a-year priority for us,” he said. Read more.