How this works
What we sell, what we do not, and how to tell the difference
Who owns us, how we make money, which things on this site are paid for, how you can tell the difference, and what to do if we get something wrong. If any of this turns out not to be true in practice, we would rather you told us.
Who owns EBN
Employer Branding News is owned and published by Fathom Data Labs Pte Ltd, registered in Singapore, company number 202410787C. It is independent. No agency, platform, vendor or investor in this industry has a stake in it or a say in what it publishes.
EBClub is operated in partnership with Beyond Cloudnine Ltd. They take a share of EBClub membership and event revenue. They take no share of anything sold on the EBN rate card, and no share of the Provider Directory, and they have no editorial involvement in EBN.
We are in our own directory. Fathom Data Labs and Beyond Cloudnine both appear in the Provider Directory, carrying exactly the same visible tier label a paying competitor carries, ranked by the same rules. If we ever gave ourselves a placement we would not sell, this page would be worthless.
People Jobs and the other properties in the same group are named as such wherever they appear here, rather than presented as independent third parties.
How we make money
EBN is free to read and always has been. It is paid for by suppliers to this industry, which is worth knowing when you read it. The revenue comes from:
- Provider Directory listings. Free listings, and paid tiers that buy a fuller profile and better placement.
- Advertising on the site and in the directory.
- Partner content. Sponsored articles and thought leadership, always labelled.
- Newsletter sponsorship, with slot counts capped on purpose.
- Video, podcast and webinar sponsorship.
- Research sponsorship and commissioned studies.
- Events, through EBClub.
- Job advertising, through People Jobs.
Every rate is published. We are the only title in employer branding that we know of that publishes its full rate card, and we think that is a better answer to "what are they charging for this" than a contact form. See the rate card.
The one rule everything else follows from
Our editorial voice is not for sale, at any price.
Coverage, opinion and analysis cannot be bought. No commercial relationship, current, past or hoped for, changes what we write about a company or what we conclude about it. Being a paying advertiser buys you no favourable coverage, and it buys you no protection from unfavourable coverage either.
The corollary matters as much: we do not publish paid content pretending to be editorial. Anything a company paid for is labelled as such, in the same size type as everything else.
What is editorial and what is paid
The honest version of this is a table rather than a paragraph.
| What it is | Who writes it | Paid? | How you can tell |
|---|---|---|---|
| News, analysis, opinion, interviews | EBN | Never | No label. This is the default, and most of the site. |
| Sponsored article / advertorial | The client, edited by EBN | Yes | Labelled partner content, its own URL, visually distinct, kept out of the main feed and the editorial newsletters. |
| Thought Leadership article | EBN, from an interview | Yes | Labelled partner content, published under a named byline from the client's organisation. |
| Provider Insight | The client, fact-checked and house-styled by EBN | Yes | Labelled, on the directory blog, pinned to that provider's listing. |
| Category buyer guides | EBN | Sponsorable, one sponsor per guide | The guide is ours and the sponsor does not shape it. The sponsorship is named on the page. |
| Provider Spotlight | EBN, from an interview | Yes | Labelled, in the newsletter and on the directory. |
| Directory listing | The provider | Free or paid | Tier is shown on the listing. See below. |
| Ads, on site and in the directory | The advertiser | Yes | Labelled as advertising or sponsored, and they look like ads. |
| Newsletter sponsor slots | The sponsor | Yes | Labelled in the email. Slot counts are capped, because a newsletter that is mostly sponsorship stops being opened. |
| Research papers | EBN | Sponsorable | Sponsor named on the report. See the research section below. |
| Job ads | The employer | Yes | They are job ads, on a jobs board. |
Section sponsorship is not article sponsorship. A company can sponsor a newsletter, a series or a guide. That is a named association with a body of work. It is not the same as paying for a specific article to say a specific thing, which is the line we do not cross.
What the directory tiers actually mean
Tiers are visibility, not endorsement
Free, Enhanced and Featured describe what a provider has paid for. They are not our assessment of how good that provider is, and they are not a vetting result. A Featured provider is not better than a Free one. They are more visible, because they paid to be.
What the Verified badge means
Only that we checked the company is real, trading, and who it says it is. It is granted with any paid tier and it is never sold on its own. It is not a quality mark, and we will not pretend it is one.
- Free listings are real listings. They are searchable, filterable and tagged on exactly the same data as paid ones. Paying improves how prominently you appear and how easily you can be contacted. It does not buy the right to be found at all, because that is free.
- We do not sell exclusivity below the top tier, and where inventory is scarce we say how scarce it is rather than implying it.
- Ads inside the directory run across a category, never against a named competitor. You cannot buy a placement that appears specifically on a rival's profile.
- Nobody pays to have a competitor removed, downranked or excluded. There is no product for that and there will not be one.
- You can be listed without paying, and you can leave. See corrections and removals below.
Links, and why we will not sell you one
Some directories in this category sell links that pass search ranking credit. Google is explicit that this is a link scheme, and the risk lands on the site doing the selling. Our domain authority is the thing advertisers are ultimately buying access to, so we intend to keep it.
Our links are earned by verification, not by payment. Claim your listing, let us confirm you are who you say you are, and your link is a standard editorial link at any tier, including Free. Pay us and you get visibility, contactability and placement. You do not get a different link, and we will not quote you one.
| Where the link is | How we mark it |
|---|---|
| A listing we imported that nobody has claimed yet | rel="nofollow", until someone claims and verifies it |
| A claimed and verified listing, any tier including Free | Standard editorial link |
| Every advertising placement | rel="sponsored" |
| Client links in sponsored articles, thought leadership, Provider Insights and sponsored guides | rel="sponsored" |
| Links in editorial | Standard editorial link, chosen by whoever wrote it |
Sponsored research
We publish original research, and sponsors can put their name to it. Here is exactly what that does and does not mean.
What a sponsor gets
Their name on the report and the landing page, early access to the findings before publication, and the launch coverage and events built around it.
What a sponsor does not get
Any say in the questions, the sample, the analysis or the conclusions. We publish what the data says, including the parts that are inconvenient for the sponsor, and we will not withdraw a finding because a sponsor dislikes it.
Every sponsored paper states its funding, its method and its sample size inside the report itself. Research a sponsor can shape is worthless to you, and one cycle later it is worthless to the sponsor too.
How we use AI
We use AI tools for research, transcription and drafting support. Every piece we publish is edited and signed off by a person who is accountable for it. We do not publish AI-generated copy that nobody has checked, and we do not present AI output as reporting.
The same standard applies to anything a partner supplies us. If it reads as though it was generated and not read, we will send it back.
What we will not do
- We will not sell access to the people in EBClub. Suppliers can be found. They cannot hunt. No member lists, no scraping, no unsolicited messages, and lead capture is opt-in only. Sponsorship buys visibility, never entry.
- We will not run a sales pitch inside a practitioner session. Sponsor moments at events are short, useful and clearly what they are.
- We will not write a story because someone bought something, and we will not spike one because someone did.
- We will not publish partner content that is only marketing. We edit for quality, we ask for evidence behind claims, and we can decline to publish. That is what makes appearing here worth anything.
- We will not sell the Verified badge separately, or any other trust signal on this site.
Enforcement. One warning for minor breaches. Immediate removal, without refund, for spam, scraping member data, or fake profiles.
If we decline to publish
We reserve the right to edit partner content for accuracy, clarity and house style, and to decline to publish something we do not think meets the standard. We would rather have that conversation before you write it than after.
If we decline a piece we have already been paid for, you choose what happens next: revise it and resubmit, move the fee to something else on the rate card, or take a full refund. We will tell you why in writing, and we will do it before publication rather than after. We would rather return the money than run something we cannot stand behind.
Corrections, complaints and removals
If we got something wrong, tell us. Email editor@employerbranding.news with the URL and what is inaccurate. We aim to respond within two working days.
- How corrections appear. We fix the error and add a dated note at the foot of the piece saying what changed. We do not quietly edit a published claim and pretend it never said otherwise.
- Directory listings. Many listings were compiled by us from public sources, which means some will contain mistakes. Claim your listing to edit it yourself, or email us and we will correct it.
- Removal. Ask and we will remove your listing. We will not make you pay to be taken out of a directory you did not ask to be in.
- Complaints about coverage. Same address. It reaches a person, not a queue, and disagreeing with our conclusion is a legitimate thing to raise even when the facts are right.
Last updated 26 August 2026.
Employer Branding News is published by Fathom Data Labs Pte Ltd, Singapore.
Commercial enquiries: partner@employerbranding.news · Rate card