Before you hit “Publish” on that product review you just wrote up, you better make sure that you’ve disclosed any relationship you may have with the manufacturer.

The United States Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has been working on some new guidelines for disclosing any relationship a person may have with a product they are reviewing or endorsing.  While these new rules have been known to be coming, everyone seems a bit shocked by just how stiff the fines will be.

In a vote of 4 to 0, the commissioners voted to enact new guidelines effective Dec. 1 that will require celebrities to reveal any relationship they have with a product they are endorsing, and bloggers will have to to disclose any compensation they have received for writing the review.  This includes both actual payments and any item you may have been given for free that has a monetary value, which means if you receive a free item and you write a post about it, you must disclose that.

The new guidelines go on to say:

The revised Guides also add new examples to illustrate the long standing principle that “material connections” (sometimes payments or free products) between advertisers and endorsers – connections that consumers would not expect – must be disclosed. These examples address what constitutes an endorsement when the message is conveyed by bloggers or other “word-of-mouth” marketers. The revised Guides specify that while decisions will be reached on a case-by-case basis, the post of a blogger who receives cash or in-kind payment to review a product is considered an endorsement. Thus, bloggers who make an endorsement must disclose the material connections they share with the seller of the product or service.

Bloggers that are found guilty of not disclosing a relationship could face fines of up to $11,000.

The FTC says more details will be forthcoming.

Related:

Entry was posted on Monday, October 5th, 2009 at 3:05 pm under Legal.

Read more entries by Sean P. Aune.
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