One of the more irritating things about this hobby, especially for newcomers, is that the marketing language used to describe the products and tobaccos in this hobby is utterly impoverished. Literal centuries of marketing gimmickry and legal hairsplitting have made it very difficult to actually be precise when talking about our favored leaf.
The aromatic vs. nonaromatic thing is a perfect example. As the smokingpipes.com article makes explicit, what is an aromatic is incredibly subjective. If we were to operate on the assumption that an aromatic is any tobacco that has added flavors not intrinsic to the tobacco itself, that may seem to be a useful line to draw. But in truth, it would essentially make nearly every pipe tobacco an aromatic, which considerably robs the term of its usefulness. For instance, a navy flake with a light rum topping would be definitionally the same as a black cavendish soaked in cherry flavoring. These two tobaccos are quite different in taste and composition from one another, so grouping them together categorically on the matter of artificial flavoring seems rather obtuse, especially when you consider that relatively few tobacco blends are entirely absent of some additional or artificial flavoring.
We see this level of imprecision in practically every other marketing category of so-called tobacco "families." Balkan blends are neither necessarily from the Balkans or follow a uniform standard, and orientals cover a very broad range of different leaves and flavor profiles, to list just two examples. So, what can we do about this?
I think all we can do roll with it and just work with common usage. For example, when a person tells you they like English blends, they are not typically referring to blends that are made in England or adhere to an old English law prohibiting added components. They are telling you, generally speaking, they like Latakia. Common usage is serviceable for general conversation, but can still be daunting for a newcomer. But it can be adopted over time fairly easily. It won't take long for any newcomer to figure out that what most people mean by aromatic blends are those blends that feature strong artificial flavors that are the primary, and not secondary or tertiary, flavor profile of that blend (e.g. Cult's Blood Red Moon is a cherry aromatic, and the cherry flavor is far stronger than the "natural" flavors of the tobaccos therein). But we are all humans, and we seek comfort in patterns and compartmentalization. I'm no exception to this, and I tend to, in my own common usage, subdivide aromatics into two groups: light and heavy. Light aromatics have artificial flavors, but they are secondary or tertiary flavors and not dominant (e.g. the plum flavoring in Royal Yacht, a Virginia blend). Heavy aromatics are the other way around, such as the aforementioned Blood Red Moon.
I suppose one can break down things by being precise by the specific kind of leaf, the manner in which it is prepared, and in what quantities it is put in any blend. For the purposes of formal reviews and expressing connoisseurship, that would be ideal. But that seems an overcorrection, because that is almost too precise, and requires a palate and pool of knowledge that is attainable by many years of experience and only appreciated by those with similar levels of experience. That's not a bad thing and is in many ways preferable to the terms given to us by marketing gurus. But it may be tough for everyone, newcomers especially, to readily grasp. The pipe tobacco connoisseur, such as they are, would not be able to give you a consistent answer to your question either, and some would-be gatekeepers of taste will sneer at aromatics as being a "lesser" tobacco. But that's another topic altogether.
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