What the US Federal Trade Commission expects

General information, not legal advice. This chapter summarises published regulator guidance in plain language. For a decision that matters, read the cited documents and talk to a qualified adviser.

What the Endorsement Guides are

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is the US agency responsible for consumer protection, including the law against deceptive advertising. Its main guidance on endorsements is the "Guides Concerning Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising", published in the Code of Federal Regulations as 16 CFR Part 255. The FTC revised them in 2023.

The Guides describe themselves as administrative interpretations of the law. They are not a separate statute and do not create penalties on their own. Their job is to explain how the FTC applies the general ban on deceptive practices in the Federal Trade Commission Act to endorsements. In practice that makes them the best single statement of what the FTC expects, and the agency can bring enforcement action under the Act when practices fall short.

The FTC also publishes plainer guidance on the same subject. Three documents matter most for affiliate publishers: "FTC's Endorsement Guides: What People Are Asking", a long set of questions and answers; "Disclosures 101 for Social Media Influencers", a short guide for creators; and ".com Disclosures", an older but still published guide on making disclosures work in digital advertising.

What counts as an endorsement

In the Guides, an endorsement is broadly any advertising message that people are likely to believe reflects the opinions, beliefs, findings or experiences of someone other than the advertiser. That includes written reviews, videos, social posts and, since the 2023 revision, tags in social media posts. It does not need the word "recommend": showing a product in a favourable way can be enough.

An affiliate article that praises a product and links to a place to buy it fits comfortably within that description. So does a "best of" list, a comparison table with buy buttons, or a newsletter item pointing readers to a deal.

Material connections

The central duty in the Guides is to disclose a "material connection" between the endorser and the seller. A material connection is a relationship that might affect the weight or credibility the audience gives the endorsement, where the audience would not reasonably expect it. The Guides list examples that include business, family and personal relationships, payment, free or discounted products, early access, and the chance to win a prize.

The FTC's answers to frequently asked questions deal directly with affiliate links. They say that if a website or blogger earns commission on sales made through links to a retailer, that is a material connection, and readers should be told about it.

Two qualifications are worth noting. A disclosure is only needed for connections the audience would not already expect: an advertiser praising its own product in its own advert does not need to announce that it sells the product. And the disclosure does not cure a misleading claim. If the review itself is false or unsupported, a disclosure does not make it acceptable.

Clear and conspicuous

The Guides require disclosures to be "clear and conspicuous". The 2023 revision added a definition: in plain terms, the disclosure must be difficult to miss and easy for ordinary people to understand. The definition goes on to explain what that means in different formats:

• A visual disclosure should stand out by its size, contrast, location and how long it appears, so that people notice, read and understand it.
• An audible disclosure should be delivered in a volume, speed and cadence that people can easily hear and understand.
• On social media and the internet, the disclosure should be unavoidable.
• The disclosure should use the same means as the endorsement: if the endorsement is made in video and sound, the disclosure should be too.
• It should be in plain language, should not be contradicted or undermined by anything else in the message, and should be in the same language as the endorsement.

The ".com Disclosures" guide adds practical detail for web pages: place the disclosure close to the claim it relates to, make it prominent, avoid making people scroll or click to find it, and repeat it where a long page or a series of messages means people might see the claim without the earlier disclosure. It warns against relying on a hyperlink for important information, and says that if a link is used, its label should tell people what it leads to and why it matters.

What the FAQ says about affiliate links

The questions-and-answers document is the most specific FTC source for affiliate publishers. Its main points, paraphrased, are:

• Disclose on the page, near the links. A disclosure should be close to the affiliate links and recommendations it relates to, so readers see it before deciding whether to click.
• A separate page is not enough. A single "disclosures" or "about" page, or a line buried at the very bottom of a page, is not a substitute for a disclosure where the recommendation appears.
• Plain words beat jargon. A simple statement that you earn commission from purchases made through the links in a post is the kind of wording the FAQ treats as adequate. The FAQ suggests that a bare label such as "affiliate link" may not be understood by everyone.
• Each place needs its own. A disclosure in one post does not cover a separate post, a separate social media message or a separate video.

Honest opinions and real use

The Guides require that endorsements reflect the honest opinions, findings, beliefs or experience of the endorser. An endorsement cannot make claims the advertiser could not lawfully make itself. If an endorser says or implies they use a product, they must actually have used it at the time. And an advertiser may keep using an endorsement only while it has good reason to believe the endorser still holds the view expressed.

For affiliate publishers this means two things. First, do not describe experience you do not have: "I have used this for a year" must be true. Second, the commission rate should not decide the verdict. A review that ranks products by payout but presents the ranking as a judgement of quality gives readers a false impression, and a disclosure does not fix that.

Who is responsible

The Guides spread responsibility across the chain. Advertisers can be liable for misleading statements their endorsers make and for an endorser's failure to disclose a connection. Endorsers can themselves be liable for statements they make and for failing to disclose. Intermediaries such as agencies and networks can be liable too, for example if they help create or spread misleading content.

The FTC's guidance expects advertisers to have reasonable programmes in place: telling endorsers what is expected of them, monitoring what they publish and acting when problems appear. "Disclosures 101" makes the same point from the creator's side: creators are responsible for what they post, and a brand's instructions do not excuse a missing disclosure.

The US rules in brief

The FTC also has a separate rule on consumer reviews, which bans certain practices outright. Chapter 06 covers it.

Next: What UK advertising and consumer rules expect