branded content

A marketing ploy that uses "news" articles which are paid for and/or created by advertisers that look like traditional editorial content, but come with a marketing message.

For example, Google News is a news aggregation service that is fighting to get rid of "branded content" and has warned publishers to keep these articles out of Google News because it is not a marketing service.

Historical perspective: In 2016 a Stanford University study found that 82% of middle schoolers couldn't distinguish a real news story on a Web site from a "sponsored content" post by a business.