Why You Should Add Sponsored Content to Your Media Mix in 2025

Sponsored Content has been around for years, harkening back to the earliest days of radio & TV, and n print like magazines, or newspapers, back then it may have been known as “advertorial advertising” but these days it goes by a few different names you’ve probably heard before, “native advertising” or “content marketing”. Regardless of the platform or the era, the principle is the same; Sponsors (advertisers) create content that appears native to the platform to engage with an audience, and tell their story. 

‍

Since Sponsored Content is designed to look and feel like regular content, it’s often seen as less intrusive and more engaging for readers than ads appearing in more traditional placements. Sponsored ads are a great way to fight “banner blindness” a term given to describe a user’s tendency to ignore positions and page elements that a user perceives as an ad. Banner blindness is a learned behavior just like looking for a logo at the top left corner of a website, or the top banner for the navigation. Sponsored Content has a higher likelihood of being seen and recalled, because it exists outside of a website’s “blind spots”.

Sponsored Content can be targeted to reach a specific audience, whether through paid content ads targeting visitors to a story page, or by the location of the page itself, nested within similar related content. Users can be targeted by demographics, interests, or behaviors, ensuring the message reaches the most relevant potential customers. Often, the content itself is created using enticing messaging or images that would resonate with a desired user.

‍

The platform Sponsored Content appears on can also affect how a user perceives the story. Trusted media outlets, or established outlets, offer a positive “brand rub”, which can help a brand build credibility and foster trust with an audience by association. Appearing on high authority websites helps give local brands a bit of a boost through this halo effect.

‍

Sponsored Content is written to be engaging, it’s in the nature of it’s conversational, storytelling format. For this reason, we tend to see higher levels of engagement compared to traditional ads; tracking better time spent, likes, comments, and shares. Which isn’t to say you should abandon other traditional media formats altogether! Sponsored Content is a great compliment to other, more direct tactics, which can benefit from its role as a reinforcer in the customer path to purchase. Proper tracking of engagements and conversion can help you analyze the effect Sponsored Content has on your overall media mix, and allow for data-driven optimization. 

‍

If you’re looking for a unique platform to tell your story in a cost-effective way, it’s worth considering how to use Sponsored Content in your media plan. Compared to traditional channels, content delivers high impact, at a relatively low cost when leveraging niche or highly engaged audiences.

‍

Incorporating Sponsored Content into a media mix can help you build authentic connections with your existing and potential audience, and improve campaign performance, helping you achieve marketing goals!