Risk & Business Magazine Miller Insurance Summer 2019 Magazine | Page 12

KILL THE MEDIA
HOW SPONSORED CONTENT COULD
KILL THE MEDIA
BY: JOE PULIZZI, FOUNDER OF CONTENT MARKETING INSTITUTE
W
hen I started out in
the B2B publishing
business almost 20
years ago (working
at business-to-
business media company Penton Media),
sponsored content creation for our
B2B advertisers felt like a second-class
citizenship: Sure, my company liked
the revenue, but sponsored content was
not viewed as critical to our business;
rather, it was seen as ancillary. Actually,
that was even the name of our group:
“ancillary media.”
When Penton Media was sold in
2006, its buyers barely even looked at
the revenues coming from content
12
marketing projects and sponsored
content. They believed it was just “one-
off” revenue and not important enough
to value in the deal.
Today, a very different story is being
painted. Nearly every media company on
the planet is selling sponsored content
or incorporating native advertising into
all their revenue offerings.
In fact, Huffington Post, which started
their partner studio with around 10
people in 2014, has hired more than 100
people just to work on clients' content
projects; at The Atlantic, three quarters
of its digital revenue is now generated
from sponsored content. And for some
businesses (like BuzzFeed, for
example), sponsored content
accounts for nearly all revenue.
As the traditional media model of
advertising continues to break down,
publishers are increasingly turning to
sponsored content as their savior. And
why not? It has led to some amazing
turnarounds – including those at The
Washington Post and The New York Times.
According to research from the Native
Advertising Institute (in cooperation
with FIPP), publishers’ price sponsored
content significantly higher than banner
advertising, and, on average, sponsored
content comprises 19 percent of total
advertising revenues. Soon, this number
is expected to jump to 33 percent.
Simply put, brands are
buying this stuff…a lot of
it. According to Business