Marketers Flock to Ads in Sheep’s Clothing

First, an introduction:

For the past four years, the hardtracking staff at Sneak Adtack has chronicled the explosion of stealth marketing, which attempts to trick out advertising as entertainment or editorial content. From product placement to product integration (working the brand into the script) to branded content to native advertising, it’s all about deceiving consumers into thinking that marketing messages are something they’re not — that is, credible, reliable, non-biased information.

Next, an intervention:

Someone needs to flag the white-flagging of native ads.

Exhibit A: NiemanLab stalwart Joshua Benton’s recent piece on native advertising and the mainstream news media . . .

Read the rest at Medium.