Example: what a sponsored article looks like here

This is a sample, kept online so that prospective partners can see exactly how a paid article is presented. It is marked as an example in the disclosure, it carries a noindex tag, and it is left out of the sitemap. Nothing in it describes a real business.

What the sponsor gets

A sponsored article is a normal page on this site with three differences. It has a disclosure at the top and the bottom naming the sponsor. Its outbound links are marked as sponsored, so this link to the sponsor’s site carries rel="sponsored", and a link with an agreed different attribute, like this nofollow demonstration link, carries the one stated. And it lives in the sponsored section, away from the neighborhood and category pages, which it does not change.

What the tone is

Plain, specific, first person if the sponsor wants it. A coffee shop can say when it opened, what it roasts and which corner it is on. It cannot say it is the best in Austin, because we cannot check that and neither can the reader. Internal links to the site’s own pages, like the East Austin page, are allowed and carry no special attribute.

What the reader gets

The same thing they get everywhere else on this site: an honest label. If a paragraph was paid for, it says so, in the same type size as the rest of the page.