Worried About The FTC’s New Guidelines For Testimonials? GOOD!

By now you’ve surely heard about the FTC’s new guidelines for testimonials and endorsements in advertising and marketing.

It’s a hot topic to be sure…

Some view it as the living, breathing embodiment of government run amok.

Others feel it’s long overdue and welcome these guidelines in hopes of better legitimizing an industry that is rife with misrepresentation and fraud.

My take is probably somewhere in between.

For better or for worse, I have quite a bit of “skin in the game” in matters of sussing out deceptive trade practice and legal compliance. In a previous business, I experienced first hand what it’s like to survive being in the crosshairs of sweeping government action in an industry with a “checkered” reputation.

From my perspective, the ONLY reason that business survived a brutal, multi-year federal investigation was because we took decisive action very early on to position the company well against this kind of “consumer protection” and required an obsessive degree of documentation, acknowledgments, and self-preservation tactics designed specifically to fend off any such “attacks”.

We KNEW some people would complain unfairly. We KNEW competitors would play dirty. We KNEW that kooks and crazies can cause a remarkable amount of collateral damage with very little effort.

More importantly, we recognized that with the emergence of social media and the huge bull-horn of the Internet turning “free speech” into a free-for-all battle for attention, things could get really ugly – fast.

And they did… and they DO. More so now than ever, actually.

Look, I completely understand the point of view from those that bellow, “people are IDIOTS! They make poor buying decisions and then blame the marketer after the fact”.

Yes, often times they are and often times they do. All the more reason to absolutely ensure that they cannot ever harm you with that defective tomato they call a brain.

Thank Buddha we ignored the rationalizations, warnings and cajoling from others that we were “paranoid” and “killing sales” with our beyond tough affirmative disclaimers and disclosures all of which went well above and beyond the actual letter of the law.

Two of our largest (and slimiest) competitors forfeited some $80+ million dollars… and that was before the FTC grew the sharp new fangs they will soon sink into someone somewhere. You don’t really believe they did this for NOTHING, do you?

That’s the “for worse” part…

The “for better” part is that I spent a few solid YEARS working with quite literally a “legal dream team” comprised of the most well-respected attorneys in the highly specialized field of compliance and defense of consumer protection investigations.

We’re taking former federal prosecutors and US Attorneys, state regulators, investigators… the lethal, razor-sharp weaponry that makes up the arsenal of state and federal consumer protection and law enforcement.

Armies like these don’t come cheap and they don’t suffer fools. In that world, you either “get it” or you “get gotten”.

I got it.

Through our years spent together, they taught me the government’s playbook for building and bringing cases (about which I will say only this: if they want you, they can get you). Indeed, I have seen first hand how far the rabbit hole goes and it SCARED THE LIVING SHIT OUT OF ME.

Those who dismiss this recent development out of hand are as delusional as the “marketers” who foolishly bray about swapping Oprah for Rachel Ray on their flogs and landing pages to continue “business as usual” because they feel out of reach of the long arm of the law or otherwise think they’re flying under the radar.

I have only one word for these numbskulls: E-Discovery.

When the Eye of Sauron is on you, you are in deep dookie, I don’t care WHO you are.

The go-go-go instant results world of Internet Marketing is only now beginning to attract the attention of a huge, violent, lumbering beast that operates with one tactic: SCORCHED EARTH.

The slow, grinding wheels of justice move very slowly and methodically. They often take a long time to arrive at their target destination. But like a giant wrecking ball, once it’s set in motion the only outcome is destruction in its wake.

Somewhat like watching a freshly-cut tree slowly falling onto and crushing a car in its path, you can only stand by and watch in slow-motion horror. And the aftermath is always rubble.

So, friends, fellow marketers, savvy entrepreneurs… I implore you to take heed.

Change is afoot.

My very public prediction is this: in 2 years time Internet Marketing will look very, very different than it does right now. There will be casualties. But there will also be PROGRESS.

While some will lose everything, others will rise up and thrive.

It’s evolution, baby…

Time to “get it”.

Your thoughts?

Photo Credit: http://www.credos.us/zoofythejinx/

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