The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) released new regulations on Monday that may limit the use of endorsements and testimonials by both blogs and celebrities.

According to the press release describing the new Guides, “Advertisements that feature a consumer and convey his or her experience with a product or service as typical when that is not the case will be required to clearly disclose the results that consumers can generally expect.”  A weaker version of this disclosure regulation was present in the 1980 version of the Guides, where advertisers were required to display “Results Not Typical” whenever using a consumer testimonial that stretched the ability of their product’s actual performance.

The most notable part of the new Guides to any internet user is the regulation of the Blog medium. Bloggers or other word-of-mouth marketers are now required to be more transparent when endorsing a product.  According to the Guides, “Bloggers who make an endorsement must disclose the material connections they share with the seller of the product or service.” This means if a blogger like Philly D is given $500 and free Aerosmith concert tickets to endorse a new Axe body spray, they must disclose that information to the public.

The last segment of the revised guides states that both endorsers and advertisers will be liable for “false or unsubstantiated claims made in an endorsement – or for failure to disclose material connections between the advertiser and endorsers.” So if Chuck claims the Total Gym can get you ripped in 60 days, he better be telling the truth.

Overall the new guides are a good move by the FTC, to keep consumers more aware of bogus advertisements and to help consumers distinguish between advertisements and real, honest endorsements.  It’s a shame that these ‘honesty’ rules never apply to politicians who promise change.