Inbound Marketing

The FTC (The U.S. Federal Trade Commission) announced it’s new guidelines concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.

“Under the revised Guides, advertisements that feature a consumer and convey his or her experience with a product or service as typical when that is not the case will be required to clearly disclose the results that consumers can generally expect. In contrast to the 1980 version of the Guides – which allowed advertisers to describe unusual results in a testimonial as long as they included a disclaimer such as “results not typical” – the revised Guides no longer contain this safe harbor.”

Let’s use the example of one of those typical online marketers who are telling you that if you buy their product (for $4,999.00) you can expect to be rich in weeks. Just follow their easy to use step-by-step system and you will be raking in the dough. Along with the sales page on their website, they have many testimonials from people claiming to cash in on the big bucks by using the system. Under the new system the owner of this product must be able to either prove that these testimonials are the typical results that you will achieve or they must also balance it and clearly state what the typical results will be. It is no longer acceptable to just say “results not typical.”

“The revised Guides also add new examples to illustrate the long standing principle that “material connections” (sometimes payments or free products) between advertisers and endorsers – connections that consumers would not expect – must be disclosed. These examples address what constitutes an endorsement when the message is conveyed by bloggers or other “word-of-mouth” marketers.”

Let’s look at an example here. The most common one, if you are recommending a product/book and are being paid for your recommendation in any way (typically called affilate marketing.) You must disclose that you are getting payment. As you can see on my Bookshelf page, I have been putting a notice on my website for a long time now that I receive a small payment with my affilate account with Amazon. I get pennies from Amazon for anyone buying these recommended books (but I am also careful not to recommend anything that I don’t believe in).

“The Guides are administrative interpretations of the law intended to help advertisers comply with the Federal Trade Commission Act; they are not binding law themselves. In any law enforcement action challenging the allegedly deceptive use of testimonials or endorsements, the Commission would have the burden of proving that the challenged conduct violates the FTC Act.”

The bottom line is that in this day and age, it is not only prudent to be as transparent as possible, it is the right thing to do. I find that it is sad we have to have organization like the FTC tell us what the right thing is. The majority of us run our businesses and treat our customers exactly as we wanted to be treated. When you offer something of value and quality than there is no need for manipulative marketing. You can still endorse and make money from working as an affilate, just be transparent about it.

As always, I am not a lawyer and you should get legal advise about these issues.