ADVERTORIALS

An advertorial is essentially paid-for editorial within a newspaper or magazine. The advertiser pays for the space and can pretty much dictate what is written about their product or service. Too often in Thailand advertorials appear thinly disguised as news stories. Some magazines even include the cover story as part of their rate card price list.
We've been pretty fortunate to get some big companies to come on board and purchase advertorials within our magazine. ING Funds and IBM are just two examples, and each advertorial includes the words "Special Advertising Section" and is distinguishable from the rest of the editorial by its design.
So why would a company pay for words rather than have a traditional advertisement? The reason in our case is that our magazine has a 79-year history of trusted, balanced and respected reporting. Readers believe what they read and advertorials allow customers to take advantage of those benefits.
We charge more for advertorials because of the time involved. Generally we interview people from the company and need to get approval for what we write. That can take days in some cases. The increased costs reflect the time we have to devote to this increasingly important revenue stream.