Overview
Native Advertising is a form of online advertising that matches the form and function of the platform on which it appears. For example, an article written by an advertiser to promote their product, but using the same form as an article written by the editorial staff." - Wikipedia
For news publishers, this essentially means a "news article" that has been sponsored or paid for by an advertiser.
Zen Templates
On BLOX Zen templates, it is easy to set up a "highlighted" sponsored content slot which can be used for Native Advertising content.
Create a story and add it to any category (where you want it to run) with a Sponsored or Advertorial flag on it. Add a Custom Property of "highlight = true" to it, if you want it to have a highlighted background.
You can add it to a block as a Sticky Asset so it sticks to the top, or you can just let it flow naturally through your content.
In the Headline List block, you can see the sponsored content with a light yellow background.
On the Index Page it shows up as well, with a Sponsored Flag and an associated business (parent):
If the story is associated with a User Author (Business Owner) and a business parent, information about them will show on the story page.
If attached to a business, you can see analytics for the native campaign in the Business Summary report.
Flex Templates
On Flex templates, the set up is similar to Zen, but has a couple of differences.
Create a story and add it to any category with a Sponsored Flag on it. The Sponsored by is automatically applied to the card.
If the parent business has a custom property of "promote_website=true" then clicking on the referring link will send you to the sponsor's website that is listed in the Website field under Info of the Business Directory listing. If the Custom Property is not set, then the Reference Link will send you to the Business Directory listing itself.
