Testimonials & Endorsements

Testimonials & Endorsements

An essential tool of business or a potential disaster?

Most businesses do not set out to trick or deceive potential customers. However the inappropriate use of testimonials and endorsements can easily come across as such.

Testimonials from satisfied customers are often hard to come by or sound just not quite right. The urge to make your own or edit the ones you already have to be a little more favourable, can often be to tempting to resist.

Many businesses have fallen into a habit of using logos from prestigious customers as an implied endorsement, in place of a formal testimonial.

The former can lead to accusations of false and misleading advertising. The later is!

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All testimonials must be freely given, be able to be substantiated and relate to your current business.

You are required to hold documentary evidence that a testimonial or endorsement used in marketing communications is genuine and hold contact details for the person who, or the organization that, gives it (UK. Code of Advertising Practice rule 3.45). 

·     You must have documented permission to use that testimonial/endorsement publically. 

·     That it is relevant to that business, service or product. 

·     That the review has not been incentivized (paid for in anyway).

·     Testimonials or endorsements must also be recent and up to date.

·     You cannot use former employers or previous businesses clients or testimonials as your own.

Once you have been accused of trying to trick or mislead your reputation will be very hard to recover.

Have you testimonials made professionally by a competent advertising agency and all this can be taken care of for you. It can be easier for customers to talk freely to an independent third party. Than to the person or business that they have been asked to review.

All reviews do not have to be good. The odd neutral or poor review can often help validate the good reviews. Nobody is perfect all the time!

Gavin Bryan-Tansley - Vid-FX+ Advertising

Is communication an illusion?

To paraphrase George Bernard Shaw. 

"The biggest single problem in social media marketing is the illusion that communication has actually taken place."

How do you judge the success of your communications? 

Clicks, hits, views, likes, etc. Do not indicate that communication has taken place. The whole purpose of social media is to build a dialogue. For that dialogue to happen there must be someone there to respond to enquiries and most importantly make the sale.

Too often I see ad's vlog's blog's or even hear a podcast that piques my interest, I need to know more. I make further enquiries to find a website that is down and no one to answer my enquiries. By then I am talking to someone else who can answer my questions and convinces me that I really do need what they are offering and can negotiate a good deal. 

So, your advertising and marketing has worked, congratulations. Yet without someone there who can take the calls, field the enquiries, to make the sales. You have just given business away to your competitors.

Before embarking on an advertising or marketing campaign you MUST ensure that you have the infrastructure in place to handle the enquiries and sales that it will generate. If you don't someone else will.

Without effective communication, you have no sales. Without sales, you don't have a business.

Gavin Bryan-Tansley

VidFX+ Advertising.

Royalty-Free Images

Royalty-free images





Does not mean FREE images, there can still be FEES to be paid. 



Royalty-free, or RF, refers to the right to use copyright material or intellectual property without the need to pay royalties or license fees for each use, per each copy, volume or some time period of use or sales.

Royalty-free - Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royalty-free

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Royalty free commonly means that you are required to pay a one-time fee for the right to use an image (or other copyright protected work), according to terms & conditions published by the stock library. Royalty free usually means that there are no on-going license fees due for further use. It doesn’t mean that the image is free of copyright or indeed FREE!

Even free to use, or creative commons licenses, can have terms and conditions attached to them. The majority, specify ‘personal use’ which does not include commercial use. Nor the right to modify adapt or change the image or design. Only terms and conditions that explicitly allow for free commercial use are free to use for a business or any organisation that expects to profit from the use. This also includes not for profit or charities unless specifically stated in the Terms & Conditions

The best advice is read the stock libraries licence and terms and conditions before you use any of their material. Check specifically to see if they offer legal protection should some dispute arise and that you have specific permission to use the image commercially.

Always remember that you do not hold an exclusive licence to use royalty free images hundreds, even thousand businesses in your area could be using same images for their businesses. If you are looking for exclusivity, look elsewhere, or better still commission your own bespoke images.

Please note: this is only a summary, that one or more copyrights, licences or exclusions can exist on a single image. Always check the terms and conditions of the licence before use.

Gavin Bryan-Tansley

VidFX+ Advertising.

Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate Marketing

On the 9th March 2017, the United Kingdoms Code of Advertising Practice. Published new guidance from the Advertising Standards Authority about recognising marketing communications. 

That is rules on how affiliate marketing must identifiable as an advert. 

Affiliates, need to ensure that consumers know that what they’re looking at is advertising. That means making sure it’s clear BEFORE consumers engage with it. Often, the context alone will make this clear. But sometimes the content might need to make it obvious that it is an advert.

This is often the case in social media, Vlogs, Blogs, news sites and voucher sites etc. Businesses, or individuals, who create content or websites that give an impression of independence. Must take extra steps to highlight content that is advertising for a third party. 

This new guidance, provides some suggestions, tailored to different platforms. Giving affiliate marketers some inspiration, but the key principles to bear in mind are;

• Where a piece of content wholly relates to affiliated products. It needs to be clear that the whole piece is advertising. Thus it may be necessary to use an identifier (such as ‘Advert’ or similar) in the title;
• If only some of the links and content to affiliated products. It is those aspects, that must be identifiable as advertising. By for example, labelling the relevant links/sections;

The guidance is also to remind businesses. That allowing their affiliates free rain over the content and targeting of ads. Does not absolve them of the responsibility for ensuring that marketing communications. That they reap the benefits from, must follow the advertising rules.

If you are an affiliate marketer. Or a brand that uses affiliate marketing. You can get up to speed with the new guidance shown here.

To swear or not to swear, that is the question.

Over the last few months, I have seen many articles advocating the use of swearing in advertising. While swearing, can be a powerful tool. It is not something that I would advocate using without seeking professional advice. Particularly if the general public could access the advert.

Where guidelines on this issue can be rather vague, established precedent is more specific. You cannot swear where children, vulnerable and impressionable adults, can see it. Nor in a context that may cause alarm or offence. 

Should you choose to use swearing, make sure that you have considered the context in which it's used. The product or service it is in relation to. As well as the chosen medium, its reach and the audience who will viewing it. Then estimate what the potential damage to your business could be. As well as the possible public reactions.

Even though some humorous use of swearing has used before. Other attempts have fallen foul of the regulators. For instance. French Connection used 'FCUK' as a high profile brand identity in the 1990’s. While they also used FCHK and FCUS, it was the FCUK logo that gained worldwide popularity. Yet, this popularity did not extend into the 21st century. While swearing maybe used as bit of a joke. Advertising for the ‘UNT mug’ fell flat on its face. (Google images for the ‘UNT mug’ to see why.)

“But it's only on my social media." 

"It's only for limited circulation."

"Who’s going to notice?”

These are some of the excuses I have heard.  None of these justify poor and inappropriate choices of words in your advertising.

If you are convinced that this is the route for you. There are some items to consider.

1. The UK Code of Advertising Practice, covers web-based media. This including websites, social media and online video. 

You are just as liable for an obscure web ad on your site, as for a national TV advertising campaign.

2. You are still liable, even if someone else shares your material. 

If you get your advert right, people will want to share it. Will your advert be compliant with the obscenity laws of other English speaking countries? Could it cause offence to other races or cultures? 

3. It takes only one complaint to have an advert taken down. 

That's right, just one single complaint. You had better be sure of your audience.

Importantly:

Why are you making an advert if no one is going to notice? The whole point of advertising is to attract attention, to get noticed. Hiding an advert where only a select few can see it is a waste of time, money and resources. 

Would I recommend that a client uses swearing in an advert?

Generally no. It mostly fails to achieve its objective. Currently too many are attempting to use this technique inappropriately. Which means the conditions that would make such an advert outstanding; do not exist at this time. Swearing no longer has the impact to gain the notoriety that is required for it to succeed. You will only be seen as copying a trend, not as the trendsetter.

Have I ever used such techniques? Yes. But that was in different time and a different place. When there was no Internet and values were different.

I would suggest that the pundits advocating the use of swearing in advertising. Are not the ones who will suffer the consequences if things go wrong.

Gavin Bryan-Tansley - Vid-FX+ Advertising

Is tourism only for holidays?

While in St Andrews the other week, I noticed the vast number tradesmen vans in the town. All the shops that had been closed a few weeks earlier, were being refurbished. 

This was undoubtedly in response to the Open Golf Championship coming to the town. With retailers and hoteliers wanting to make the most out of this event and the visitors who will be coming to their town in during that period. Some of these tradesmen's vans came from Manchester, some 300 miles away!

Tourism is as much about Business as Holidays.

It struck me, that tourism should become a major concern for many businesses and trades that don't currently don't think that it applies to them. If there were plumbers, from Manchester working in St Andrews. Why was there a plumber in from less than a dozen miles away from the town complaining about a lack of work?

The answer? 

From a quick survey, I found that the Manchester plumber is actively advertising in various trade papers and websites, while the local lad relies solely on word of mouth.

The moral of this story is, “if you are not advertising, you are not in business!”

If this strikes a cord with you, I suggest that you contact me at Vid-FX+Advertising. So that, we can discuss how you can make the most of your advertising opportunities.

Gavin Bryan-Tansley - Vid-FX+ Advertising