Native Advertising: Confusing or Clever?

Native advertising is getting some attention in media publications because it is growing in frequency among online publishers.  Native advertising is intended to look like the publication, it blends in, camouflage-like to the site's page framework. An ad wearing the site as a Halloween costume. Words are important and we have a responsibility to use them with care.

So I'm of two minds about this.

In the clunky old "advertorial" format, an advertiser writes a helpful article-looking item about choosing storm gutters for your house. They might even
sign it with a byline and a photo. But the writer's descriptor at the bottom gives it away: "Bob has helped thousands of Grass Valley area homeowners invest in his kind of gutters. Call Bob today at (800) I-BOT-THIS." It was possibly informative once, but Bob keeps buying the same 10 column inches and running the same article every week, undermining his credibility and the newspaper's credibility, with a paper-thin veneer.


On the other hand, from the perspective of a publisher, developing native content that can then generate advertising revenue with clicks or sponsored ads is really valuable. And this article One Quarter of News Revenue Come From Native Advertising points out that this revenue stream is growing: 11% in 2015 and projected to grow to 25% in 2018. We do all like growth...

As a non-profit, you have lots of great content lying around like infographics, research reports, mission-specific accomplishments, events and real tips for health or consumer protection, or whatever you don't make your profits about.

The non-profit could generate some additional revenue for the organization if you thought like a publisher. What would it take for you to convert your in-house news into native advertising and generate either traffic or revenue?

• Create quizzes and surveys that you post on Facebook and Twitter, leading back to your site
• Identify and write up a few "you wouldn't believe this lady's response to... whatever problem you solve and create a few Facebook ads with an outrageous image. That ad leads back tot he complete article (you never under-deliver) with links to donate or sign up for a newsletter or volunteer stint.
• Share results of surveys as new reports on issues key to your organization which lead back to donation-gathering landing pages
• Publish these things on your own site. Or it might make sense to distance yourself just a bit and create an additional site for this newsy material and post Google ads on those pages for a little revenue bump.

You could also sell native space on your website, if you have the traffic to justify it, to supporters or partner companies and organizations. Make some money while promoting your friends and providing information to your audience.