On December 1, 2009 there will be some changes in how testimonial advertising is done. These new guidelines will affect bloggers and other “word of mouth” advertisers. Here is what the guidelines say:
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.
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. The revised Guides specify that while decisions will be reached on a case-by-case basis, the post of a blogger who receives cash or in-kind payment to review a product is considered an endorsement. Thus, bloggers who make an endorsement must disclose the material connections they share with the seller of the product or service. Likewise, if a company refers in an advertisement to the findings of a research organization that conducted research sponsored by the company, the advertisement must disclose the connection between the advertiser and the research organization. And a paid endorsement – like any other advertisement – is deceptive if it makes false or misleading claims.
The new guidelines are a way to keep the truth in advertising in social media marketing. The FTC did not necessarily see a problem at this time but wanted to prevent problems in the future. Unfortunately, there are always people who take advantage of the “no rules” and ruin it for all the “honest” people out there.
If you are honest in your blog posts, then you will not have a problem. And that is what all advertising should be.
This video is about using traffic exchanges to promote your business. There is a good site to visit for more information on many types of advertising (paid and free). It is called Traffic Generation 101.
To find the top ten traffic exchanges, I recommend Affiliate Funnel.
Oh and look for my cats in the background…they just had to be in this video!
Donna Filipiak is an online business entrepreneur. She enjoys helping people by sharing information that will help their business grow. Traffic Exchanges to join.
Donna Filipiak is an online business entrepreneur. She enjoys helping people by sharing information that will help their business grow. Global Domains International
