Aloha! What are your solutions for the new FTC rules?!

[The Kahuna]

Aloha my new friends...What are your solutions for the new FTC rules?
Mahalo.

The Kahuna

[Jason Anderson]

Changing my blogs....

Here is a brand new one I just put up with all my disclosures:

http://marketingmix.me

Notice the legal forms tab and the disclosure I have right on the home page in the sidebar.

[The Kahuna]

Jason, Mahalo (thanks)...This is an important topic.

[robfoster]

FTC rules ? I'm not sure what you guys are point at.Is it regarding disclosure of paid reviews and paid content ?

[The Kahuna]

Effective December 1, 2009...

The FTC website has videos to watch

search for: About Endorsement Guides

Aloha from Maui,

The Kahuna

[opportunitiesaplenty]

I don't really use testimonials anyway, so I'm not too worried about that. About disclosure of a financial relationship, I've thought about removing my affiliate text links and just replacing them with a well placed banner ad, possibly directly below the review, post, or article. It is common knowlege that an ad is a result of a financial relationship between you and the advertiser, so you wouldn't have to add any additional disclosure. I might start split testing that and see how the conversions and click throughs compare with the regular text links

[Rob Whisonant]

No changes at all for me. Have always been honest on all my sales pages and don't do the fake testimonial bull****. So does not effect me at all.

Re's
Rob Whisonant

[sanjid112]

Doesn't affect me at all. Always trying to be honest, and if there any testimonials on my sales page, it is done properly. I always give some free copy to my beta-tester, and asked them to write honest review about it. That's my testimonials. So, I think, it won't hurt me with the new FTC rules.

-Malik

[bgmacaw]

Unfortunately, the laws and regulations are written so vaguely that virtually anyone with a website that has advertising can be prosecuted for a federal felony under them. Fortunately, the FTC and the federal court system only has the resources to go after low hanging fruit, right now at least. Bottom line, don't make yourself an obvious low hanging fruit. Don't do stupid stuff, like the acai floggers have done, and work quietly.

[Sylonious]

The big thing is testimonials or giving specific results that you had with a product you are selling.

The solution for that is generic wording and product comparisons.

For Example -

"I had a hard time with Chris's blue widgets. I was only able to increase my vertical jump by 3-inches in 5-months of use. However I did manage to get much better results with Jame's blue widgets. The difference between the two products was significant."

You wouldn't have any relationship with Chris's blue widgets at all so you can't get in trouble for giving your personal results with it. It might even be better (safer) to not name the other product you are comparing the affiliate product to.

However, with James' blue widgets you are the affiliate and you must keep your results generic ("better results, significant etc. etc.).

You also can't make charts anymore. I think I read in the pdf that a comparison chart must be backed up with scientific studies or something like that.

Originally Posted by opportunitiesaplenty

I don't really use testimonials anyway, so I'm not too worried about that. About disclosure of a financial relationship, I've thought about removing my affiliate text links and just replacing them with a well placed banner ad, possibly directly below the review, post, or article. It is common knowlege that an ad is a result of a financial relationship between you and the advertiser, so you wouldn't have to add any additional disclosure. I might start split testing that and see how the conversions and click throughs compare with the regular text links

That will probably kill your conversion rates. Just take a 250 by 250 product image, left or right align it (at the top of the article) and add the words "advertisement" in small print at the top of the image.

You might want to put some words in the image as well.

Originally Posted by sanjid112

Doesn't affect me at all. Always trying to be honest, and if there any testimonials on my sales page, it is done properly. I always give some free copy to my beta-tester, and asked them to write honest review about it. That's my testimonials. So, I think, it won't hurt me with the new FTC rules.

-Malik

You can't have any testimonials on your website. There is no such thing as testimonials done properly.

Originally Posted by Jason Anderson

Changing my blogs....

Here is a brand new one I just put up with all my disclosures:

http://marketingmix.me

Notice the legal forms tab and the disclosure I have right on the home page in the sidebar.

Some of the hardliners at the FTC wouldn't even approve of that. Still, I remember one of the higher-ups saying that just having a little blurb outside the text would do just fine. So what you have is just fine.

"When in doubt, disclose," says Cleland. Disclosure on each post is preferable to creating a section for sponsorship information. Many bloggers have created disclosure buttons that their readers can click, but they give no indication as to why readers should open up the information. "If you're writing about something and getting paid to do it, just work it into the writing," Cleland says. "There's no disincentive to stating what you're doing and why you're doing it."

He says that like he's had some blogging experience.