Adverticle is a term coined by blending of the words ‘advertisement’ and ‘article’. In practice, adverticles are used as a strategy in free marketing. The advertisement of a product or a service is concealed within an article which can, but does not have to, be directly (or obviously) correlated thematically with the object of marketing.
Traditional marketing strategies have been decreasing in efficiency over the past decade. Potential consumers have been bombed by ads and commercials to such an extent that they have developed the ability to simply block them out psychologically. Whether referring to commercials on the television or ‘pop-ups’ on the Internet, traditional marketing does not serve its purpose anymore – to attract customers.
Consequently, business owners and commerce experts found new ways of placing their products and services on the market. The adverticle strategy can be undertaken in print as well as online. However, due to the possibility of instantaneous linkage to the so called ‘money sites’ (by creating anchor tags in the adverticle, potential consumer can be led to home pages of products and services), online adverticles are somewhat more effective. Moreover, print versions of adverticles differ in color and/or material from the main body of the magazine or newspaper and as they are textually more ad-like, they are usually looked upon as ad pages and discarded.
There are two major types of adverticles.
On one side, there are adverticles which are constituted as articles which provide information and/or opinions narrowly related to a specific product or service. For example, an article written about the first live drone footage of an erupting volcano, with an anchor tag to a home page of a drone manufacturer.
On the other side, there are adverticles which deal with completely unrelated topics but manage to sneak in (in a non-invasive manner) an anchor tag to a product or a service. For example, a text about being in touch with the nature and an anchor tag for a window blinds manufacturer (it could go something like this: If you are unable to find some time to spend in the nature, at least open your window blinds and try to soak in the sunlight of the urban jungle.).
The adverticles are actually a part of the process of inbound online marketing. The process is oriented on a non-invasive approach to potential customers. It involves forming circles of followers through communication on social networks (which is not based on promoting products and services). The entrepreneur provides articles and texts on topics which might interest his visitors and unobtrusively directs them to his home page. This approach proved to be extremely efficient and rewarding for both customers and business owners.
Some argue that the adverticles are a cheat-sheet for making people spend their money. While this is basically true, it is not something we can frown upon nowadays. All marketing is oriented towards making a profit of a sort. Consumers who spend are the ones who bring the profit. Therefore, marketing is oriented towards consumers. Adverticles are simply the new (and a bit more subtle, not to say subliminal) way of bombing people with ads and commercials.
