New York Times publisher Pinch Sulzberger told employees Dec. 19 that he’s launching a native advertising program early next year because advertisers want  “new, more immersive ways of engaging consumers.”

Though banner ads “will continue to be an important business,” native advertising or branded content “will restore digital advertising revenue to growth – something we need to do to support our investment in the journalism of The New York Times,” Sulzberger wrote in a memo to staffers.

Vowing that readers would be able to distinguish between NYT editorial content and paid plugs, he wrote: “There will be a distinctive color bar, the words ‘Paid Post,’ the relevant company logo, a different typeface and other design cues to let readers know exactly what they are looking at.

“There will be strict separation between the newsroom and the job of creating content for the new native ads. And, we will require advertiser content to adhere to a very high standard of quality.”

Sulzberger admitted that native advertising is sometimes controversial. “There have been occasions where publishers have put native advertising in front of readers in ways that did blur the line between journalism and commercial messaging,”

He’s determined that reader confusion over native advertising won’t happen because the Times “will put all necessary safeguards in place to ensure that it doesn’t.”

The paper’s advertising department, design unit and newsroom supplied input to the creation of the native advertising program “to ensure that there is never a doubt in anyone’s mind about what is Times journalism and what is advertising,” wrote Sulzberger in his memo called “Why is The Times launching a native advertising product?”