Native advertising has become the focus of attention in recent marketing discourse. Based on discussions, one might think it is a new marketing trend, however it is not entirely a novel phenomenon. It is only resurfacing in a new format with updated content and layout requirements for the digital media channels. The problem stems from the fact that native advertising makes the separation of editoril and business side of news difficult. The growing corporate influence in the media defies the principles of free independent press and impartial journalism. In the world of digital media where ads gain easy visbility in banner and pop-up formats, advertising in printed media might be hard to attract. Thus, marketing content in the form of reporting seems to provide a solution for that. A 2015 reporting claims that twelve percent of ad revenue in 2014 at the Wall Street Journal, for example, involved custom advertising, including native. Furthermore, native contributed to a 2 percent increase in Journal ad revenue in the first quarter of 2015 (Moses). Does this kind of corporate influence affect the integrity of news in printed?
It started its career as a tool of persuasion at the beginning of the last century, when the media coverage of events was meant to increase the publicity of a given brand. For example, car races run by hobbyists coupled well with Ford’s automobile ads. Such advertising was present all the way through the radio and TV broadcasting history. Perhaps the most well-known example of native advertising from the TV era is provided by the soap operas, where even the name of these series hint that they served as a marketing tool for soap advertising. In the 1950s Bulova, Sun Oil, Lever Brothers, and P&G signed on as the first sponsors of such commercial telecasts. With the advancement of the Internet, search engines like AOL, Google, and Yahoo promoted company websites alongside search results, leveraging consumer intent to drive business results at mass scale. That allowed companies like Google to spread their power (Manalo).
Native advertising has become a whole industry sector. Researches are conducted to observe the revenue changes triggered by native advertising. A survey by Michele McLellan earlier this year shows that more than half the independent online local news publications are selling sponsored content. Services and even institutions, such as the Native Advertising Institute, are established to help marketers to become successful with this advertising format. Thus, considering its popularity, it must live up to the expectations businesswise. However, the questions arise: Does native advertising affect the nature of journalism? Are readers aware of the nature of content they are consuming?
Recent U.S. federal guidelines and industry recommendations request clear and conspicuous labeling of sponsored news articles, however, it is not really examined how these labels shape the interpretation of the content, if they do at all. A recent study by Wojdynski suggests that “a majority of consumers of online native advertising may miss disclosure labels entirely, and thus fail to recognize the content as paid advertising. Fewer than one in five participants recognized the article as advertising, and those who recognized it perceived it as highly deceptive. The fact that perceived deceptiveness contributes to negative attitudes toward the brand provides an incentive for publishers, advertising to make their native advertising disclosures harder to miss, and harder to misinterpret.“ Thus, it is definitely difficult to tell apart reporting of news from an advertising content. Will it eventually skew how news is understood and interpreted?
References: Hansen, T. 2016. Melanie Deziel: I’ve Seen Advertisers Struggle to Tell Authentic Stories. Accessed on Sept 17, 2016: http://nativeadvertisinginstitute.com/blog/melanie-deziel-advertisers-struggle-to-tell-stories/ McLellan, M. 2016. A 2016 snapshot of the local news startup business. Tow-Knight Center for Entrepreneurial Journalism. Accessed on Sept. 18, 2016: http://towknight.org/2016/05/micheles_list_2016_survey_results/ Manalo, J. 2014. A Brief History of Native Advertising. The Content Strategist. Accessed on Sept. 16, 2016: https://contently.com/strategist/2014/03/28/a-brief-history-of-native-advertising/ Moses, L. 2015. The Wall Street Journal's native approach: 'If it looks like a puff piece, nobody's going to read it.' DIGIDAY UK http://digiday.com/publishers/wall-street-journals-native-approach-looks-like-puff-piece-nobodys-going-read/ Wojdynski , B.W. 2016 The Deceptiveness of Sponsored News Articles: How Readers Recognize and Perceive Native Advertising . American Behavioral Scientist July 2016. doi: 10.1177/0002764216660140