Tips of the Week: 7 Things Buzzfeed Teaches Us About Native Advertising

It’s time to break down the native advertising best practices and see how Buzzfeed content marketing team sets the bar for the sponsored content trends. Native advertising can benefit your brand if you do it right; let’s see how you can do it right.

Buzzfeed is an enormous project that currently streams content to more than 90 mln people every month. The key to their traffic success is in the ‘social sharing’ activity of their users and the level of their social media ‘game’ in general. Currently, more than 75% of Buzzfeed traffic comes from social media. This makes them a tremendously big platform for advertisers who want to get a sponsored post and branded content.

As of today, Buzzfeed charges around $90,000 for one native advertising post. Of course, it means that brands get a lot at this price. Every sponsored post on Buzzfeed tends to perform great and, sometimes, people love their branded posts so much that they don’t even notice that this was indeed sponsored. Today we’ll tell you their key secrets to BuzzFeed native advertising success.

1. Plan your content distribution as good as content creation

When it comes to Buzzfeed native advertising, people highlight how good the content quality is. It’s true, but let’s face it — if you didn’t think through how you’ll distribute this content, you’re doomed. 

Those who try to understand the Buzzfeed content marketing strategy tend to note that the key to their success is a well-thought-out content distribution process. 

Know what social media platform users can find this sponsored post content truly useful and aim to bring them value with this article. The idea here is simple — you should waste as much time on content distribution plan as you spend on content creation. This is a perfect middle ground that Buzzfeed native advertising keeps in balance.

2. Approach the promoted content as editorial to achieve the best quality

One of the biggest mistakes you can make while working on branded content is thinking that it’s not worth your ‘creative mind.’ Some media platforms tend to think that advertising posts are just meant to be a bit boring and straightforward. That’s something we cannot say about Buzzfeed native advertising.

This is a simple rule that you can put right to your editorial guidelines for the team to follow. Branded content should be as exciting and top-notch as the editorial pieces. 

Only if you make the sponsored post valuable enough — it will be as successful as your editorial content.

3. The promoted content can be even better than editorial

Let’s even put it this way — you can, and you should bring your promoted content to an entirely new level if you want to achieve the level of the Buzzfeed native advertising. 

Your aim should be to make each post so good that your next advertising partners will stand in a line to get promoted on your platform. Sometimes you’ll even have to waste more time on branded content than on your core editorial pieces, but that’s the price you’ll have to pay to become a platform where everyone wants to be featured. Isn’t it what you want after all?

4. Don’t trick people and never hide the sponsored post tag

Some platforms try to trick their audience and hide the fact that they’re reading branded content. At the same time, Buzzfeed native advertising says: ‘Yeah, this is a sponsored post, but it’s still valuable for you and here’s why.’

That’s one of the things you should definitely learn from the native advertising trends that Buzzfeed sets.

5. Make emotionally compelling content

Just like any article on Buzzfeed evokes emotions of their readers, the native advertising post should be emotionally compelling as well.

Let’s face it — native advertising benefits you, it’s a financial investment to your platform’s revenue. But you users should get something out of it as well. There are no benefits from native advertising that users can receive if you just put out a simple sponsored post. 

At least bring some emotions to your user. Impress him and make this content entertaining, so your website visitor would not feel like it was a complete waste of his time.

6. Make sure your native ad looks and feels ‘shareable’

We have already highlighted that the biggest traffic potential of Buzzfeed native advertising lays in social media. This means that any sponsored article they deliver should be shareable to go viral and get on a spotlight. 

Your branded content should always be potentially viral and attractive enough to share it on social media. Let’s call it one of the native advertising best practices — making your sponsored post shareable, so you unleash the real traffic potential behind your branded content.

7. Authenticity is a key

Sponsored content can be and should be as good as your editorial content. That’s what Buzzfeed native advertising teaches us. 

While working on your branded post, you should make sure it doesn’t look spammy and does not stand out from your regular content in a bad way. If you don’t put enough effort into making the branded post authentic, it won’t get the amount of traffic you want it to get. 

Here’s a general rule of thumb for you: will our average user find this article useful?

This question should always stay in your head when you prepare sponsored content. The latest native advertising trends show that users hate useless content with no intent. Remember that this post should match the general editorial guidelines of your platform.

Final thoughts

There are lots of pros and cons of native advertising, but no matter what — it’s one of the best ways to deliver branded content on your platform. This way, you have a chance to make sure that all parties benefit from native advertising. Your user comes to your website for top-quality content of your niche, so the sponsored content you put out should equal the bar you set for your main editorial content.

Try Buzzfeed’s approach to native advertising; try to advertise your partners in the most entertaining and compelling way. This can help you gain the most loyal audience and, at the same time, get numerous requests from brands regarding advertisement on your platform.