Earlier this year the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) gave new meaning to the phrase
“Give Credit Where Credit Is Due”
Here is basics of the what’s going on. Let’s say you meet a person who tells you about a new product or service. This same person goes on to tell you how well the service is and all the benefits of using the service. The question that gets raised is does this recommendation influence your decision to buy the product or service?
Now let’s go one step deeper. Does the person that told you this information get paid to endorse, brag or tout about the product or services? Would you want to know about the financial relationship? Ensuring marketers, influencers, and advertisers keep relationships disclosed is what the FTC endorsement guidelines are all about.
And you betcha these FTC endorsement guidelines have an impact on…….
Social Media Branded Content Guidelines
Questions you need to be asking yourself to protect your business and avoid FTC fines.
How does this change the way you should create branded post?
Branded content is defined as a creator or publisher's content that features or is influenced by a business partner for an exchange of value. Simply posting a picture of a product in social media, such as on Facebook, or a video of you using it could convey that you approve of the product. If it does, it’s an endorsement. If your audience thinks that what you say or otherwise communicate about a product reflects your opinions or beliefs about the product, and you have a relationship with the company marketing the product, it’s an endorsement subject to the FTC Act. Keep your disclosures unambiguous and make your disclosures hard to miss.
Are hashtags acceptable to utilize as a disclosure with branded post?
No. Hash tags are not enough to disclose a relationship between two parties representing a product or service. As an example, including the hashtag "#sp" (meaning "sponsored post") might confuse consumers unfamiliar with the term. Burying a "#ad" at the end of a long chain of hashtags might not suffice either. Don't bury your "#ad" or “#sponsored” at the end of your post where it may not be visible due to character limitations. And if you're a business using social media influencers to promote your product check up on sponsored posts and make sure the connection to your company is clearly disclosed.
What features are available on Facebook to support branded content?
The first area on Facebook to get the branded content was the Ad Manager section. Here is a preview of this section from the Ad Manager:
The area is not so easy to find and in fact, you must send a request to Facebook in order to get the section enabled. After Facebook approves your Business page to post branded content your publishing tools areas will look like that following:
Use the branded content tool in addition to using Hashtags and you should be well within the FTC act and in compliance.
What benefits can my business expect to see when tagging post to have branded content?
Despite this appearing to be a huge hassle, there are some added wins to using branded content tools or tagging (mentions) brands. The additional post reach you gain when tagging and using the branded content tool is an expected upside marketers will see. For marketers using Facebook, the insight metrics is shared with the brand you are endorsing. The transparency is the best practice and can be of great benefit to those that utilize insight metrics to optimize their organic and paid campaigns.
Conclusion
If you are a client of Released Solutions and subscribe to our online presence management services, my team has already submitted a request to Facebook's team for your business page to get the branded content tool enabled. If you are not a client click the button below to submit your request:
