I’ve just picked up on a brilliant article on the website, The Fashion Law, entitled The Dirty Advertising Practices of The Industry’s Biggest Brands, Bloggers. Wow – so the author is pulling no punches and sounds as thoroughly p*ssed off as the rest of us trying to do the right thing. I put a link on Twitter and it’s been re-tweeted and commented upon many, many times so there is a lot in this feature that is resonating. I highly recommend that as a blogger, Instagrammer or brand, you take ten minutes to read it HERE.
The jist of things is that a paid collaboration between US blogger, Aimee Song (SongofStyle) and Laura Mercier (I know, gutted) seems to be in breach the FTC Act (US based Federal Trade Commission) by not declaring sufficiently that the partnership is a commercial one. The FTC Act deals with commercial messaging and specifically forbids ‘unfair and deceptive acts and practices’, of which non-disclosure would be one.
As the feature on The Fashion Law points out, Song is just one of many, many breaches that happen every single day. It’s just that it happens to be high profile enough for everyone to sit up and take notice. It is so commonplace now not to declare, or to fudge a declaration, that we can barely be bothered to raise a brow at it. It’s just like, ‘oh, sigh, here we go again’. Without the proper backing of authorities with any bite or influence, quite how this can be policed is anyone’s guess.
If you’re looking to the ASA, although I think they’re doing their best in an under-resourced environment, it’s just not enough. I will give you a very good example of how it’s hard to have faith. A blogger friend reported (call it a controlled experiment) a very high profile blogger for non-declaration. She was told that she would need to email the blogger concerned herself. She then got a relative to make a non-declaration complaint and that was upheld by the ASA. So, even if we try and police things ourselves, internally, we’re rather held back by the petty assumption that it’s a personal spat when nothing could be further from the truth.
It’s highly frustrating to work in an industry that is becoming less and less trusted by the day, and any kind of self-policing is given such short change. The ridiculous ASA rule that as long as the brand has had no influence on the post, it doesn’t need to be declared that it has been paid for needs to be changed as a matter of urgency. This anomaly is a get out of jail free card for both brand and blogger.
Then we wander into the murky territory of bought followers and likes on Instagram along with the sea of non-declaration. In comparison, blogs look like the Vicars of the internet! I kind of imagine a bunch of wide-eyed Instagram employees huddled in a corner, crying, “we don’t know what to do….” Because the situation is SO out of hand. It is an embarrassing number of brands who can’t even do the most basic influence due diligence and check the authenticity of followers. It’s not just the brands being tricked here, it’s also the agents and worse still, the consumers.
The Federal Trade Commission is there to protect the consumer. As I understand it, if bloggers are paid-posting about a brand, it falls under the FTC Act because it’s commercial speech. In turn, if that constitutes deception of some sort, it’s a violation which takes into account all social media. It’s messy and it’s all legal jargon which is why I suggest you read the original feature.
I can cite you hundreds of instances where bloggers/vloggers/instagrammers are paid to attend events, open shops, make public appearances on behalf of brands and they are all either undeclared or based on false followers. Those of us who bend over backwards to comply all of time (after all, why not be proud of your achievements?) get so frustrated and angry about this. If you charge £70,000 to make a post or a video, you have a huge responsibility to ensure that all the legal boxes are ticked. I’m not saying for a second that influencers should not be paid, but nobody wants to be the brand that paid that money (that’s a UK price – in the US you can add a nought) then to be named and shamed when the influencer is caught. But the high profile nature of the Laura Mercier (still gutted) and Song collaboration where brand and blogger are well and truly busted is the opening of a gateway. Pretty soon, as already happens in the advertising industry, it will be brand reporting brand and us bloggers in the awkward position of trying to keep a clean space can step back and let them fight it out. Instagram has just announced the launch of business profiles with post boosting and analytics (according to The Social Times) which is an interesting spin – if they can control their own ads on social channels, maybe influencers won’t be quite as desirable.
Ultimately, you have to question the kind of person it is that wants to fool their followers. Where is the respect for the people who digest the influencer’s content? Alongside Instagram/vlog/blogs we’re talking on-line magazines that show native content that is impossible to distinguish from real content (AdWeek guesses that 70% of native is non-compliant) and we’re also talking about celebrities who think that no rule applies to them when they’re promoting a brand on social media. As I say, a mess.
The feature in The Fashion Law isn’t shy of naming names and it can only be a stone’s throw away from some UK journalists realising there are some very meaty stories in the murky land of Instabranding and all the other social channels. Tricks are being played on all of us – everything from influencers who insist on taking relatives along to events as their ‘official photographer’ so they can be payrolled for that too, to the wannabe influencers who buy clothes/bags/jewellery on-line to ‘pretend’ they belong to them on their social channels and return them in the next day’s post. Do not even start me on the ridiculous riders and demands that influencers are asking for.
But, here’s the thing. Brands are beginning to sanctimoniously remind us to ‘declare’ that we have been sent products, while simultaneously praying that we never talk about the teas, the dinners, the gifts, cars to and from events, the flowers, the trips, the drinks and the breakfasts (all of which I’ve had) that are all part and parcel of wooing influencers into relationships. It’s no wonder that lines get blurred, because you can have any or all of the above and still not have a ‘cash’ paid relationship. Nobody knows whether or not and even if money does or doesn’t changes hands, whether you are supposed to declare any of the above, because print never does, but everyone, absolutely everyone, needs to take a bit of responsibility for the mess we’re in now and start being more respectful to the followers, fans and consumers that are the ones who directly bear the brunt of the dishonesty.
If you’re still with me – I know, too long, sorry – I remind you once again to read the feature that sparked this post HERE.
NB: It now appears that the LM/SS collaboration is correctly tagged as #ad.
Transparency Disclosure
All products are sent to me as samples from brands and agencies unless otherwise stated. Affiliate links may be used. Posts are not affiliate driven.
17 comments
“everything from influencers who insist on taking relatives along to events as their ‘official photographer’ so they can be payrolled for that too, to the wannabe influencers who buy clothes/bags/jewellery on-line to ‘pretend’ they belong to them on their social channels and return them in the next day’s post.”
– I think we’re all very aware of non-disclosure and bought followers but these two things hadn’t even crossed my mind! I’m so shocked – and feel pretty naive!
This is such an important post and I do think it’s good that the conversation has been started. It will be interesting to see if things are about to change (as I expect they are).
The FTC Act sounds great in theory. However, they have no enforcement power. So while they may have embarrassed Aimee Song, if that’s even possible, I can guarantee you that she is still laughing all the way to the bank. (Right along with Manrepeller, Tati, and God only knows who else.)
I think that the best thing that bloggers can do — and I say this as consumer/reader of blogs — is to focus on their own content. Reporting others, while it may come from a place of good intent, only looks petty and small. Readers are not stupid. I think that most of us know that most bloggers, vloggers, and you tube types are not trustworthy. Exception made, of course, for you Jane. I do not question your character in the slightest, which is why yours is one of the very few beauty blogs that I still read.
Bloggers reporting other bloggers is really not a thing – for that very reason you mention, but the boundaries need testing to see what happens and now we know! People assume it’s for pettiness sake, when it’s not, including the institution to whom we are supposed to report which is why they won’t give any credence to a blogger but they will to a member of the public. Maybe what you are saying is that reports need to made by people with more credibility than bloggers? And, it’s not really a question of stupidity but naivety when you consider that consumers of social are so young, in the main. You’re one of my most informed commenters I think and I always look forward to hearing what you have to say, but I don’t think everyone that consumes social media is as switched on or as well researched as you are. So, we have to take some responsibility in protecting the genre that we work in as in any other profession.
Thank you for your kind words. I absolutely see and respect your point of view, Jane. Further, I do agree with you that many consumers of social media are young and impressionable. I see it with my own stepdaughter, who, at age twenty, is exactly the target for many of these campaigns.
Recently, she came to me with an article saying that a well-known you tuber is making $30,000 USD per month from her channel! Yes. PER MONTH. If that figure is even close to being accurate, it puts her in a category with high powered lawyers, doctors, professors, and tech experts! Unbelievable. A flibbertigibbet who mispronounces the names of half of those sponsored goods she pushes! How is this possible? My stepdaughter’s question was why she should continue at university if she could perhaps make a lucrative career out of you tube. It is an understatement when I tell you that this pained me greatly. Our discussion kept me from sleeping for many a night.
So after I gave her my “you do not want to be a vapid idiot” lecture, I really had to think about this. The real problem here, it seems to me, is not whether or not blog advertising is clearly labeled. Much more dangerous, I think, is the transmission of ideas about “success” to our sons and daughters. When your child thinks that perhaps she could be given the vacations, clothing, and cars that her parents worked for twenty years in order to afford, or that books and ideas no longer matter, that’s a real problem. In the States, we see the horrible consequences of such thinking in the presidential candidacy of Donald Trump. The progression from the rule-flouting blogger to a young girl’s questions about the validity of education, to the alarmingly real possibility of an anti-intellectual, made-for-reality-TV idiot in the White House, is very nearly linear, IMO.
So it’s not that I think bloggers/vloggers and the like don’t need to be questioned, it’s just that perhaps the questions should be different. Aimee Song is currently posting about the “Dior cruise” and her lunch at the Chiltern Firehouse in London today. But is anyone asking Dior how much they paid her? I see no evidence of it. And we need to question the brands themselves. Paying a small fine to the FTC is but a slap on the wrist to a company like Lord and Taylor or Laura Mercier. But when their behavior — as opposed to that of the blogger herself — is called into question publicly, that’s something else entirely. I think we in the general public need to do more of that. Journalists could do so much more, too, but I’m not holding my breath. After all, they are indebted to these same advertisers. And so it goes.
I almost think the money is irrelevant – in almost any other sector, a young person able to support themselves well, pay taxes and create themselves a job would be applauded. Their fees are dictated by what brands perceive as their value so the initiative has to come from the brands to simply refuse to pay those fees if they feel they are not worth the money. But, for someone who has created a massive following and is doing so in a responsible way, have earned the fees, in the same way a magazine would feel it has earned its advertising.. by showing the right things to the relevant people. If a brand is complicit in non-disclosure they both need to be publicly sanctioned I think.. To the point about education.. that’s definitely a worry because I think it looks (thanks to curation and filtering) far easier than it actually is. I think you can tell I’m tearing my hair out sometimes because it’s hugely pressurised and for many it won’t last – it will be a transient thing. So, for your niece – I can see why she assumes that but the ‘top’ influencers are the tip of an iceberg of thousands who never do get to the summit and hover at base camp all their blogging lives. You can quite easily scratch some pocket money from it, but employ a team to help you, buy a house in Chelsea? Only a tiny handful who hit the internet at the right time.
You might be aware that various YouTubers/Bloggers are getting all these ‘perks’ but many young and impressionable and not so astute people might not be. They should be reported, and investigated an advert is one thing and we all know what it is.. but many of these reviews, blogger events etc some how get past the advertising standards. Honesty is the best policy.. if the product is great it will sell if at the right price.
I so admire you for keeping this issue in the spot light, unfortunately people still don;t know anywhere near the half of it! The time definitely seems ripe for change, we just need to keep pushing it.
AS a magazine Journalism student, where law is very much a key part of the curriculum, I found this post very important and interesting. Like the article says, it’s such a murky territory place to police because who it the one that stands up and says “that particular brand of lipstick you’re wearing, did you just happen to own it and wear it today, or were you ‘compensated’ for wearing it?” Again, like the article mentioned, who is going to be the sad sod to go through all the posts and judge if a person has endorsed a product because they genuinely like it and want people to know, as opposed to someone who is hiding their endorsement?
People are naturally trust worthy and take things on face value, especially followers who just have genuine interests in certain products and don’t really know that much about the ins and outs of sponsored content or endorsements. It’s the same ideology that behind why people don’t assume a person is lying to them in conversation.
Just read the article. I had NO idea these “influencers” made this kind of money (“Note: According to an article from the Telegraph this past May, Bernstein makes roughly $15,000 per Instagram post.”) . The more I read these posts/articles the grosser this whole blogging world seems to me. I mean, how hard is it to say a post is sponsored? I can imagine how frustrating all this is to genuine bloggers with integrity.
Thanks for this article, Jane, very interesting reading. I have only recently (probably last 6-12months) started to read blogs and follow You tubers, I am probably a bit older than most of their target audiences! However, there is obviously big money to be made and although a blogger/vlogger posting about a new collection of make up and making a video about it and putting #ad in the post is one thing, the things that I find a bit disconcerting is when someone will be showing you a ‘haul’ and just happens to mention within that video that the £1000 handbag was a ‘gift’ but it’s not a sponsored post because they didn’t have to show it to their audience and weren’t paid to!! Grey areas indeed!
OMG Jane, you were right earlier on Periscope, I loved this article!!!
This specific subject makes me so angry!!! I hate it when bloggers/Instagramers/YouTubers disrespect their audience and also when brands lie to their clients! It’s outrageous!
As a blogger, I take a lot of responsibility in what I write on my blog because I don’t take the trust my readers place in me lightly. And same goes for my posts on Instagram.
I personally don’t do sponsored content on my blog or social media but as a reader, I don’t mind them in other blogs as long as it’s mentioned very clearly.
But I’m pretty sure that a lot of people (especially the young audience, which is very important on Instagram especially) are not aware of sponsored content.
I really hope things will change and really, we need more laws to clarify all these very touchy topics!
It really angers me seeing big bloggers/youtubers not declare properly. Like I know you didn’t buy that, and you are being paid to say it so stop and just be honest. I have unfollowed countless people over it.
From a small blogger perspective I have found the brands which do contact me are hoping I am unaware of the regulations, using me to boost their SEO with organic links (which aren’t organic)
Which has led me to declining a lot, or them refusing me when I say I will declare and use a no-follow.
Something needs to change, it just all feels so wrong!
Erin || MakeErinOver
Great follow-on piece. I find non-declarations so annoying, not to mention odd – an advertorial is just that. It can also be a great, funny, interesting post or image, but if it’s paid/based on a review product, the reader or viewer deserves to know.
Very interesting post. There seems to be a lot of blurring of lines. I personally was really turned off Kiehl’s recently to see they had taken several bloggers to Coachella in California, with the pretext of going to a very small event first, which had absolutely nothing to do with their product. As a consumer, it makes me think they should have a smaller advertising budget and charge their customers a bit less. This type of thing used to happen in the pharmaceutical industry a lot but the regulations have become very tight, which eliminates a lot of the craziness. I think it would be very hard to police the beauty industry, but there certainly appears to be a lot of infractions!
I think a lot of consumers are starting to question trips with no real purpose.
Really interesting to see. Even though the FTC Act doesn’t come with enforcement actions, it’s interesting to see the change in attitudes towards bloggers by readers, regulatory bodies etc.
As the only blogger whose actions I can control is me, all I can do is focus on doing the right thing. Keeping myself informed of the rules and best practice relating to disclosure; not do unethical things like buy followers etc. Treat my readers how I like to be treated. What others do is up to them. But if I suspect shady practice, then I unfollow. There are few brands I stay away from for the same reason.
I have sent this post to all of my friends!!! So interesting and I had NO idea. Thank you for sharing.
Mel | http://www.thegossipdarling.com