Next time your pitch misses the mark with a prickly reporter, skip the dogged relationship building and go straight to bribery. Smarmy? Sure. But as long as it falls under
the euphemistic heading of "sponsorship," some publishers are evidently ready and willing to offset soft ad revenues with what can only be described as editorial kickbacks.
Bimonthly Nevada Woman, for example, profiled three top Wells Fargo women in its June 2001 cover story in exchange for an undisclosed "sponsorship." Apparently, Nevada Woman has
been selling editorial for years but has never before disclosed the "sponsorships" to its estimated 30,000 readers.
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