Revenue Magazine announced that the FTC is proposing new product review guidelines that would directly affect affiliate marketers.  The FTC wants to make bloggers, social media users and others who express “false statements” liable. 

So, how does this affect you?  Well, you could say it doesn’t.  Your product review site or product review blog prints honest information and comparisons.  But what if someone makes a purchase and doesn’t like the item, or says that you promised that an ipod would hold 3,000 songs and it holds 2,000?  Under these new laws, you may find yourself in a court case or class action lawsuit. 

What can you do? Well, first you can make sure that if you are using an affiliate site model of product reviews or comparisons that they are as accurate as possible, and that you aren’t making false claims. You can attempt to only restate only what is said on the website, the item packaging itself or the insert.  Make sure you actually physically have  the product before you review it. Don’t state discounts that don’t exist, etc. In many cases, such as banking and loan websites, these are already requirements. 

Of course one problem with all of this is that the web is huge and the FTC can’t possibly patrol it, nor will the FTC patrol it most likely.  So my guess is that unless there are class action lawsuits taken out against the largest infringers, I’m not sure how they can possibly hope to make something like that stick. 

Here are some places where the FTC could crack down. The FTC prohibits “ deceptive pricing” in print media.   This means that the use of phrases like a $499 value for 39.95 may come under some scrutiny, as the item has never sold or priced for $499.  Also, comparisons that are biased (this is the better product because it has an affiliate program), could come under higher scrutiny, as well as standard product review sites.  

It’s important to remember that this type of regulation is already in place for tv and print media. So, it shouldn’t be too hard to follow. For more information, you can read more about FTC advertising guidelines. 

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