A Guide To Native Advertising's Legal Issues

Native advertising has by all accounts been the darling of the digital marketing world in 2013. Although it comes in all shapes and sizes, the general consensus defines "native advertising" as the practice of designing ads to look like the natural editorial content of the website on which they appear. Native's proponents hail it as the second coming, while critics assail native ads as commercials masquerading as content -- whatever your view, most everyone seems to be doing it.

A recent study indicates that about 75 percent of advertisers have gone native and the rest intend to. Social giants like Facebook and Twitter have adopted it, and publishers like BuzzFeed, The Atlantic, and Forbes have embraced it -- each with varying approaches and levels of success.