The FTC Does Affiliates a Favor

There have been a lot of talks and rants about how the FTC overstepped its boundaries. There is no question the new FTC rulings could lead to some sites being targeted while others spared with no specific reason. The ruling is comprehensive and vague at the same time (if that is possible). The FTC talks about how everyone needs to be transparent online and disclose monetary and other types of gains on blogs, affiliate sites, and portals. But the FTC may have given affiliates even more ways to make money online by keeping things as vague as possible. Right after the FTC released its ruling on affiliates and bloggers, many smart online marketers started creating products to market to other affiliates who are hoping to stay compliant with the FTC guidelines.

Think about it. There are going to be a lot of newbie affiliate marketers out there who have no idea what they are doing and will part ways with their hard earned money to stay in the good graces of the FTC. Even blackhat marketers have taken advantage of this opportunity as well. Some people are selling compliance badges to people who are trusting enough to buy them, thinking that the FTC will pass on their sites as long as they have badges all over them.

The FTC has tried to make things much more transparent for consumers, but it might have created yet another issue for the affiliates to deal with. Nobody knows how much you need to disclose to stay in the FTC’s good graces. You can disclose it all to stay on the safe side. But being too aggressive with your disclosure could take away from your bottom-line. Unfortunately, there are affiliates out there who are engaged in some shady affairs. For those folks, transparency is not their biggest issue. Blackhat marketers will never be able to justify everything they do by a simple disclosure. But for everyone else, as long as you do your best effort to show the FTC you are trying, you should be fine. The good news is that the FTC will give you a warning before taking further action. If you are warned, you can always change things around. But until then, you can always learn from what others are doing on their websites.