On Oct 5, 2009, the FTC released new guidelines about the use of testimonials. If you’re a product creator or an affiliate marketer, you should know about this one.

Here’s the easy-to-read Frank Kern version…
http://masscontrolsite.com/blog/?p=59

Here’s the FTC page…
http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2009/10/endortest.shtm

The FTC headlines say “FTC Publishes Final Guides Governing Endorsements, Testimonials.
Changes Affect Testimonial Advertisements, Bloggers, Celebrity Endorsements“.

As Frank says, “New FTC Thing Is A Bigger Deal Than You Might Think”.

Best wishes,
Gary

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Update 10 October:

“The long and short of it is that you need to make sure that you’re
not at risk of being “carpet-bombed” by the upcoming affiliate-squashing
campaign that the FTC is rolling out with its new ultra-unclear guidelines.

And this directly affects ALL affiliates.

And the cost of violation (including inadvertant, well-meaning
violations) rings in at a crippling $11,000 PER INCIDENT.”

That’s from Chris Rempel’s email this morning. You can read his full blog post at

http://www.thelazymarketer.com/blog/2009/10/09/the-sky-is-not-falling-but-this-is-definitely-a-game-changer Read the rest of this entry