FTC Endorsement Guidelines
Emma | Nov 01, 2009 | Comments 0
Starting December 1st 2009 the new FTC endorsement guidelines will go into effect. There has been, and will be, a lot of speculation about what these guidelines will mean to bloggers and affiliate marketers. I am not a lawyer and this article is to help us become more aware of these guidelines.
I assume as long as you are ethical, and don’t try to deceive would be customers, with false claims, endorsements, and free offers that are actually a monthly subscription, you should be OK.
But here is the actual information from the FTC so you can decide for yourself. I also found some useful links on the Commission Junction blog, including a link to this information from lawyers Jeffrey D. Knowles and Thomas A. Cohn. You can also find useful information at the Performance Marketing Alliance, which also has all of the updated information on the affiliate tax.
Anyway, please be aware and do your due diligence, to make sure your marketing efforts are meeting the FTC endorsement guidelines. To sum it up, here are 5 points taken from the paper written by Jeffrey D. Knowles and Thomas A. Cohn, that shouldn’t be too difficult to implement.
1. Ensure that affiliate advertising of any merchant’s products or services is truthful,
substantiated and not deceptive or unfair.
2. Do not publish “flogs” (fake blogs) or other false content, false or unsubstantiated
product claims, or offer incentives to consumers in return for their response to any ad,
unless the offer’s terms and conditions of the offer are clearly and conspicuously
disclosed.
3. Do not publish fake news articles or other fake media titles, without clearly and
conspicuously disclosing that the content is an advertisement.
4. With respect to any endorsement (third-party promotion of an advertiser’s product to
consumers), do not publish false or unsubstantiated endorsements, and be sure to clearly
and conspicuously disclose any material connections with the merchant and/or the
network.
5. Do not infringe on the personal rights, trademark, copyright, patent rights, service
mark or any other intellectual property right of any third party mentioned in published
content.
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