Here's The New York Times' First Ever Native Ad

The New York Times debuted its redesigned website today, and that includes the company's first ever native advertisement.

The Times' first ever foray into the controversial realm of sponsored content comes in the form of a paid post from Dell about how marketers and information technology departments need to collaborate more in the workplace.

Here's how the post appears to users who visit the redesigned front page of nytimes.com right now (note the sleeker design and condensed "sections" menu). I added a pink arrow to help you find it in the bottom-right corner of my screen shot:

As you can see, the New York Times has made good on its promise to mark a clear distinction between advertising content and news by stamping the Dell logo on the post and surrounding it with a blue border. This was a high priority, as The Times was anxious that introducing native advertising would trick readers into thinking the sponsored content was news.

Here's how the post looks when you click on it. Note that the features The Times said would be included in its redesigned article pages (like the "other stories" bar at the top of the page) are already in place. In the top-left corner of the screenshot, we can see how paid posts will be designated when they are recommended to readers on the top scroll bar:

Users who scroll through the story can also see links to other New York Times stories Dell thinks they might like:

And at the bottom, they'll find a selection of other content Dell has produced:

We'll have more on the New York Times redesign later in the day, including reactions from journalists and designers who've worked on the websites of other major news sites in the past.