UK ASA thinks "sponsored by" isn't sufficient disclosure for pure ad

ASA Adjudication on Procter & Gamble (Health & Beauty Care) Ltd

 

A video entitled "Easy Lip Makeup Tutorials for Winter Time" viewed on the "Beauty Recommended" You Tube channel [owned and run by P&G], featured a model vlogger. It showed the vlogger talking about and using a number of Max Factor products, as well as products from other brands, in the context of a lip makeup tutorial. At the beginning of the video text appeared which stated "Sponsored by BEAUTY RECOMMENDED, brought to you by Procter & Gamble". The video description, which could be viewed in full by clicking the text "SHOW MORE" beneath the video, summarised the content of the video, listed all six Max Factor products featured and included a link to buy the products via the online shop "SuperSavvyMe". Text at the bottom of the description stated "Sponsored by BEAUTY RECOMMENDED, brought to you by Procter & Gamble". . . .

 

We considered that viewers should have been aware of the commercial nature of the content prior to engagement. Furthermore, we considered that "sponsored by" and "brought to you by" did not make clear the marketing nature of the videos. Although they might indicate to some viewers that Procter & Gamble had been involved in the process, they did not clearly indicate that the videos were marketing communications, as opposed to, for example, material that had been financially sponsored, but over which the creator retained editorial control. For those reasons, we considered that consumers would not be aware that the videos were ads promoting Procter & Gamble, and instead were likely to believe the videos were impartial editorial content. We concluded, therefore, that the videos within the “Beauty Recommended” channel, including the “Easy Lip” tutorial, were not obviously identifiable as marketing communications.