The FTC (Federal Trade Commission) continues it’s clamp-down of the wild, wild Internet with yet another reasonable regulation:

You now have to clearly disclose if you are generating any $$ from affiliate referrals or commissioned sales on your site.

In order to comply with these guidelines your disclosures must meet four basic requirements. They must be frequent, clear, conspicuous, and require no scrolling or other type of user action to locate the disclosure.

Here are some examples of acceptable disclosure statements for affiliate links:

Disclosure: We are compensated for our reviews. Click here for details.

or

Disclosure: We are a professional review site that receives compensation from the companies whose products we review. We tested and reviewed the web hosting sites ranked here. We are independently owned and the opinions expressed here are our own.

For the disclosure to be considered clear, the font should be:

•    At least as large as the main text on the page
•    In a color other than black or gray
•    In contrast with both with its background and the main text
•    Darker than its background or the main text

Here’s an example of an unclear disclosure:

Disclosure: We are a website that needs compensation to operate like any other website on the internet. We may receive consideration for our reviews but we are totally unbiased and do not accept paid reviews or fake reviews claiming to be something they are not.

You cannot claim that you do not receive compensation if you receive payment through an affiliate program!

Hope that helps you out to stay in the clear and avoid being penalized.

The FTC also offers a variety of resources to help make it easier for you to comply with the guidelines, including:

- Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising

- The FTC’s Revised Endorsement Guides: What People are Asking

- Dot Com Disclosures: Information About Online Advertising