Celebrities and influencers who endorse products or services on social media must include disclosure words such as “advertisement,” “sponsored,” “collaborate,” or “paid advertising” in their posts.
They also shouldn’t endorse any product or service that they haven’t personally used, experienced, or done due diligence on, the Department of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution said in its new Endorsements Know-How guidelines. .
According to the new guidelines, the information must be “unambiguous, conspicuous and extremely conspicuous” and terms such as “advertising”, “sponsoring”, “collaboration” or “paid promotion” may be used.
The guidelines are designed to ensure that individuals “do not mislead” their audience when endorsing any product or service and that they comply with the Consumer Protection Act and any associated rule or policy, an official statement said.
According to the Department of Consumer Affairs, there is confusion over which disclosure word to use for which type of partnership.
Therefore, any of the following disclosures may be used for paid or token endorsement: “advertisement,” “advertisement,” “sponsored,” “collaboration,” or “partnership.” However, the term must be specified as a hashtag or headline text, it said.
“The guidelines state that individuals or groups who have access to an audience and have the power to influence their audience’s purchasing decisions or opinions about a product, service, brand, or experience because of the authority, knowledge, position or the influencer/celebrity’s relationship with their audience must be disclosed,” the statement said.
The guidelines stated that the disclosure in the acknowledgment message must be placed in a manner that is clear, conspicuous and extremely difficult to miss.
“Disclosures should not be mixed with a group of hashtags or links. When annotations are made in an image, the annotations should be superimposed sufficiently over the image for viewers to notice and video format and displayed continuously and prominently throughout the stream,” the guidelines read.
It advised celebrities and influencers to “always check and see for themselves” and that the advertiser is able to substantiate the claims made in the advertisement. It is also recommended that the product and service has actually been used or experienced by the endorser.
“The guidelines are designed to ensure that individuals do not mislead their audience when recommending products or services and that they comply with consumer protection law and any associated rule or policy. It is imperative for celebrities, influencers and virtual influencers to adhere to these guidelines to maintain transparency and authenticity with their audience,” the statement said.
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