Advertising-related content on Stuff
Monday, 29 October 2018
Here at Stuff, we are committed to clearly identifying stories which have been produced on the strength of an advertising deal.
We know that our readers come to us because they trust us to report on stories independently and without outside influence.
We uphold those editorial standards rigorously and abide by the principles and regulations set out by the Media Council of NZ and the Advertising Standards Authority, as well as our own editorial charter.
That means we don't allow advertiser considerations to influence our news reporting.
Advertisers who want to present their message in a way that mirrors our editorial content have to follow clear guidelines, all of which are based on clear labelling of the advertising material so our audience should not be confused about what it is they are reading.
The following explanation is to help readers better understand how we may sell advertising based around our editorial content:
Sponsored content
Material labelled as 'sponsored content' has been requested and paid for by an advertiser, written by commercial content specialists (not our journalists or editorial writers), and is approved by the advertiser before it is published. It looks similar to editorial, but will carry a clear label.
Sponsorship of editorial content
An advertiser may pay to have their logos, display advertisements and similar marketing material featured on a Stuff section dedicated to a particular type of content, eg our Football section in Sport, or the Cruising section in Travel; or to be associated with a specific series of articles. A logo accompanied by the sponsor's logo may feature on the relevant content, in print and/or online. The advertiser has no influence over or knowledge of the editorial content which appears in that section or series. This does not involve the creation of any commercial content which may look like editorial, so does not require any additional labelling.
Editorial partnerships
An advertiser may negotiate for Stuff to produce editorial content on a topic which relates to a broader theme or topic the advertiser is promoting. However, the content is produced without further reference to the advertiser, who has no prior approval, sign-off rights, or access to the material before it is published; it's commissioned, written and edited to the same standards we apply to all editorial content. In the Homed section of Stuff, we may have ongoing arrangements for such content with a small group of commercial advertising partners.
Travel section
Stuff Travel includes a section where visitors can book travel experiences, and these may be directly linked to from relevant editorial content. The editorial content is commissioned independently of the booking offers, and the availability of offers does not influence decisions about our editorial coverage.
Advertisers in this section may occasionally negotiate to have advertisements placed and published in alignment with editorial content about specific destinations. However, those advertisers have no influence over editorial content. As well, our journalists and travel writers may accept assistance from travel operators - including some who are advertisers - in order to gain the first-hand experiences necessary to write their stories. We never promise positive coverage in return, we brief our writers to always report objectively and independently on their experiences, and we always disclose sponsored travel.
Shoppable links
Some Stuff lifestyle content may feature products to which we attach hyperlinks leading to a merchant website. These links are applied under a range of circumstances, typically:
They may be included simply as a navigation aid to readers, with no benefit to Stuff.
They may be included as part of a commercial agreement with a merchant/advertiser, under which Stuff derives some benefit, such as data insights or a commission payment (for example).
They may be 'affiliate links', which Stuff applies without direct reference to the merchant, but receives a commission from if a reader visiting the destination site completes a purchase.
We will always disclose within the article if there is some form of potential commercial benefit to Stuff deriving from the links.
Articles featuring these links are produced to our editorial standards and our journalists are not party to commercial discussions.
The application of such links should not be considered an editorial endorsement of a product, retailer or particular deal.