The Fourth Floor Guide to Properly Declaring
CONTENTS
1. Summary of best practice
2. Why the declaration is important
3. When to declare
Integrations vs. dedicated videos
Gifted vs. sponsored
Social posts and accompanying materials
4. Different ruling bodies, and which to follow
ASA rules in the UK
FTC rules in the US
ARPP rules in France
1. Summary of best practice
Fourth Floor aims to follow best practice for commercial declaration in branded content. It is our goal to ensure that the creators we work with have an informed audience, and follow all regulatory guidelines in order to protect them from ambiguity, or any repercussion stemming from unclear declaration.
To achieve this we ask for the following standard practices on all sponsored content made in partnership with us:
The thumbnail or video title includes ‘#Ad’.
A description that visibly thanks the sponsor.
A verbal declaration within the first 30 seconds of the video.
‘#Ad’ in all social posts related to a campaign and campaign content.
This combination of practices makes the declaration hard to miss, ensures that audiences are not misled, and protects you from any repercussion. Specific guidelines can and will change, so if you are ever in any doubt, we recommend you check your local body’s website for further resources.
The above best practice should cover you in most situations, but we strongly recommend that you read on to make yourself aware of the various nuances and differences that exist between content types, situations, and regions. The Fourth Floor team are of course happy to answer any specific questions you might have directly.
2. Why the declaration is important
While the legalities surrounding advertising standards can often seem confusing, one principle is clear across the board. Advertisements in all forms should be clearly distinguishable as advertising.
The reason for this is simple: audiences have a right to know when what they are seeing has been influenced by an exchange of goods or money. Not declaring can have a negative effect on an audience’s trust, and that needs to be avoided.
3. When to declare
In the United States, disclosure is required any time you post something about a brand you have a financial, employment, personal, or family relationship with. For the purpose of this guide, we will concentrate on a financial relationship, but should you wish to learn more about the others, please look here.
Financial relationships are not limited to money. They include anything that can be considered as having ‘value’. In most instances, this additional area will comprise gifts that are sent out to content creators. But whatever the form, once there is a financial relationship in place, it becomes necessary to declare every time you post about the product or brand.
The United Kingdom follows very similar rules, requiring declaration when a brand gives an influencer a payment. In this case, ‘Payment’ means “any form of monetary payment; commission; a free loan of a product/ service; a free product/service (whether requested or received out of the blue); or any other incentive.” (Source). Once such an event has occurred, it becomes necessary to declare any time you make a piece of content promoting or endorsing the brand.
In practice, if you declare every time you make an organic video about a game or product you have previously made a sponsored video on, the messaging can become confusing and the repeated declarations lead to the diminished value of declaring in the first place.
In order to create a distinction between content directly influenced by a relationship and that which isn’t, we recommend that whenever a brand has ‘control’ of the messaging in a video, whether that video is sponsored or not, you should declare. ‘Control’ is defined as “Telling you what you have to say, e.g. if there are particular words, phrases, themes or ‘key messages’ you need to include, or you have to use a particular hashtag.” Source. In most cases, if your original agreement with the client is for a specific number of posts, it is unlikely that you will be penalised for not declaring content that falls outside of that agreement. We recommend that if you are unsure, you err on the side of safety, and declare - or seek specialist advice here.
Integrations vs. dedicated videos
The rules for declaring in dedicated videos vs. video integrations remain the same on both sides of the Atlantic. If money or gifts have exchanged hands, the content needs to be immediately identifiable as an advert, and the best way to do this is by clearly placing ‘#Ad’ in the frame during the sponsored section, or including it in the title or thumbnail. In the US, the FTC also allows ‘#Sponsored’.
Gifted vs. sponsored
Regardless of whether you’ve received direct payment or free items from a partner, you still need to declare. CAP in the UK makes no distinction between the two situations, and requires ‘#Ad’ in both instances.
Social posts and accompanying materials
All social posts you make about your sponsored videos also need declaring with ‘#Ad’. Your audience needs to be aware of the nature of the content in all accompanying materials.
4. Different ruling bodies, and which to follow
Requires declaration to be clearly visible and upfront. This means that audiences shouldn’t need to click on a video before they can recognise it as an ad.
Requires the declaration to be hard to miss. This can be achieved by having the declaration placed prominently in the thumbnail, or in the video title.
Requires that text declarations read ‘#Ad’, ‘#Advert’, or ‘#Advertisement’.
Gifts and freebies count as payment, and need to be labelled as such. This includes free digital keys for videogames, as well as physical copies.
If you have a hard-to-miss declaration in the title of a live stream, you only need to declare verbally at the start of the stream.
The United States of America - FTC
Requires declarations to be hard to miss. This is best achieved by having the declaration placed prominently in the thumbnail, or in the video title. The FTC will also accept it in the YouTube description, as long as it appears above the fold.
Doesn’t allow declarations to be mixed in among other hashtags. They need to be clear and stand alone.
Declarations during live streams should be repeated multiple times during the stream. There is no hard rule for how often this is, but Fourth Floor recommend an explicit mention every 30 minutes.
Does not require a specific format of text declaration, as long as the wording is simple and hard to miss or misinterpret. ‘Thanks to Fourth Floor for sponsoring’ is considered acceptable.
Doesn’t allow talking about a product you haven’t tried out first-hand.
France - ARPP
Requires advertisements and sponsorships to be clearly identifiable up front, with detail of the parties involved.
The identity of the sponsor should therefore be clearly labelled within the declaration. Simply displaying ‘Ad’ or ‘#Ad’ is not sufficient.