Star Magazine Drops SlimFast Ads

Last week, American Media, publishers of Star magazine, agreed to stop running unlabeled " advertorials " of SlimFast due to a lack of transparency from the weekly celebrity magazine. The Better Business Bureau's National Advertising Division (NAD), found the AMI -created SlimFast advertisements (also know as native advertising) were "...misleading readers." In other words, the Slim-Fast ad didn't look like an ad. FTC guidelines require that all forms of advertising, including native advertising, be presented in a way that is clear to readers that content comes from the advertiser. Ad pages shouldn't be designed similar to editorial content, and native ads should be clearly and labeled "advertisement" or "sponsored," This is a first for NAD, which held a publisher responsible for the way native advertising is presented in publishing. "While American Media, Inc. respectfully disagrees with some of the concerns expressed by NAD, it appreciates NAD's efforts and agrees to discontinue the challenged practice," AMI responded via an official statement.