Advertise with us
Readers pay nothing for The Watershed Review; advertisers keep it running. If your business serves Lismore, Byron, Ballina, Tweed or the country between them, the terms are all here: what we offer, what we will not do, and the rates. If you have read enough, the advertising enquiry form is here.
Who reads it
People who want the Northern Rivers reported on the record rather than on its reputation: the flood recovery, the housing story, health, the university and the land economy, each with its source attached. This is a sceptical readership, and it has earned that honestly, having been the subject of a good deal of coverage by people who left afterwards. We make no traffic claim we cannot back. Ask and you will get the figure, including when it is modest.
Two ways to advertise
Clearly labelled display advertising. A marked slot kept clear of the journalism, running your message as you wrote it. It is not designed to look like an article, and it buys no influence over what we publish.
Sponsored editorial. Researched, written and checked by us, held to the bar the rest of the site is held to, and carrying its label everywhere it appears. Claims keep their source, and nothing goes in about your business or anyone else's that we cannot stand up. It works when the story is real: a service the region lacked, work you have done, something a reader would be glad to understand. It is not a page of adjectives.
What the standard actually looks like
Telling you a paid piece is held to the same standard as the reporting is worth nothing unless you can see the standard. We have not sold a sponsored piece yet, so there is no sponsored example to show you. These are our own reporting, and they are the bar a paid piece is written to:
- Ballina put three flood maps on exhibition in one night, and they are about the rain rather than the river. 20 quotations, each traceable to one of the 2 primary sources listed on it.
- The state is writing its first multi-hazard adaptation plan here, and the values study under it says plainly it is not a representative sample. 18 quotations, each traceable to one of the 2 primary sources listed on it.
- Iron Gates is being built. Council reserved the right to appeal and never said what it did with it. 9 quotations, each traceable to one of the 6 primary sources listed on it.
That is what a data-led piece buys: primary documents read end to end, every figure and quotation traceable to the source it came from, and a question a reader actually has, answered in the first screen. If what you want is a page of adjectives, we are the wrong site and the rates below will look expensive.
What we will not do
Trust is slow to build here and quick to lose, which is precisely what makes a placement worth having, so we do not trade it. No invented reviews, no bought praise, no product-flogging, no outrage bait. The byline and the verdict are not purchasable. An arrangement buys a labelled placement, full stop. Briefs needing us to overstate, mislead or keep an interest quiet are refused, with the reason given. A masthead that could be bought would be worked out here within a month.
Disclosure, every time
Any commercial relationship is spelled out plainly, at the point it matters. That is a commercial protection for the advertiser rather than a courtesy: in a region this alert to being sold to, a label is what buys you a hearing. It is also required of us, and the rule would stay without the requirement.
Rates and how to enquire
Commercial sponsored pieces do not run below $450, and the usual figure is $600. Not-for-profits and community organisations start at $150. Data-led work, with a real dataset, an authored chart and a stated method, starts at $1,100.
Display starts at $80 a month, usually about $120, taken three months at a time. The Watershed Review is new and we would not have you buy reach that is not there yet. The rate is published so it is no mystery when it is.
| Page views from a search engine | 0 |
|---|---|
| All Australian page views | 9 |
| A reasonable reader estimate | 0 to 2 |
| About, per week | 0 search-referred views |
Measured over the 30 days to 2026-10-02, from our own server-side logs. These count views of stories, not of our tip form, advertise page or colophon. They are page views, not people: we run no cookies and no client-side script, so unique visitors cannot be counted and we will not quote you a number we cannot stand behind. The lower figure is the floor we are confident in. The range subtracts an estimate of our own visits, measured against staged mastheads nobody can reach.
The rate is public because the alternative wastes your time. What it covers is the research and the fact-checking, and the fact that the piece stays up, sourced and indexed. A cheaper rate would buy a worse piece and attract briefs we would only refuse.
Nothing about an enquiry is binding. Use the advertising enquiry form, tell us what you do and what you had in mind, and we will respond.
The standards behind all of this are at how this site works.