FTC To Monitor Affiliate Marketers – Watch Out!
Posted on June 24, 2009
Filed Under Uncategorized | 2 Comments
That’s right, as announed by the FTC two days ago, affiliate marketers are now going to have to disclose that they are making a profit for making suggestions to readers. This has been a call to action for the FTC to stop bloggers from receiving freebies (trips and products) and money for making a recommendation. Originally it was believed that this was only going to affect bloggers, but it has been confirmed that they intend to monitor all affiliate marketing.
To find out the entire story, I would read the CNet news and the Associated Press.
What does this mean? I have on clue what this means for the affiliate business. Honestly.
First off, the FTC is based in the USA so I am not sure how they will be monitoring. Will it be by IP address? Will other countries adopt a similar policy so this becomes something that is standard across the board? I cannot imagine the ligistical nightmares of this. Laslty, does this mean that marketers that reside outside of the USA will have a distinct advantage over their peers?
The second item that needs to be anazlyed is how they will insist we (as affiliate marketers) present this information to our readers. Will it be as simple as providing something like the privacy policy that all adsense users must have now? Or will it be much more obvious and have to be stated during the sale.
Lastly, is this going to change the face of the affiliate business and internet marketing? What is this going to mean for a booming industry that is responsible for billions of dollars in revenue.
I sure hope the FTC is prepared to hire on a few extra staffers. Let’s face it, this is going to be a very huge and daunting task and I’m curious to see how this is enforced.
Jodie
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