The Performance Marketer's Guide to Influencer Marketing for Heavily Regulated Brands
Influencer marketing is a must for modern brands, but for regulated brands (pharma, fintech, health tech, alcohol, cannabis, gaming, gambling, supplements, etc) one wrong post can mean warning letters from the FDA, SEC, FTC or a FINRA fine, or a PR crisis. Most influencer tools and platforms weren't built for this. This guide covers what regulated brand marketers need to know.
What Makes Influencer Marketing Different for Regulated Brands
Regulated brands must consider the rules and regulations set by compliance agencies (FDA, FTC, FINRA, DISCUS), platform restrictions from Meta, TikTok, YouTube, and reputational risk from creator content that goes off-brief or off script.
Creators don't have law degrees. They just want to make fun videos. Creating content is what they do. Working with cool brands pays the bills, but they don't know what statements will get brands in trouble with regulatory agencies. It's on the brand team to guide them and ensure that content is compliant.
Industry by Industry Breakdown
All industries must follow the rules set out by the FTC (links below) but there are also industry specific rules that brands must also follow.
- Endorsements, Influencers, and Reviews Guidance
- FTC Advertising & Marketing Guidance (Truth-in-Advertising)
- FTC Advertising & Marketing Business Guidance
- Disclosures 101 for Social Media Influencers
Pharma & Biotech
In addition to the FTC rules linked above, Pharma and Biotech brands often have additional rules and regulations outlined by the FDA. More information can be found at FDA.GOV.
Healthcare & Medical Devices
In addition to the FTC rules linked above, Healthcare & Medical Device brands often have additional rules and regulations outlined by the FDA. More information can be found at FDA.GOV.
Financial Services
In addition to the FTC rules linked above, Financial Services brands often have additional rules and regulations outlined by the SEC. More information can be found at sec.gov.
Alcohol Brands
TTB advertising regulations apply to influencer marketing. They strongly recommend that influencer ads contain statements about the risks of consuming alcohol in an easily displayed area in the influencer ad. More info can be found at TTB.gov.
Cannabis & CBD
Cannabis brands must follow additional rules set out by the FDA. A few examples can be found at FDA Cannabis Regulation.
In addition to these rules, Cannabis brands must comply with standard FTC influencer marketing regulations.
Gaming and Gambling
In the U.S., gambling advertising regulations (including influencer content) are handled state-by-state (e.g., Nevada Gaming Control Board, Colorado Division of Gaming). Gaming brands should comply with all FTC guidelines but also review any state specific rules that would be relevant.
Supplements & OTC
In addition to the broad rules of the FTC, more information on supplement brand regulations can be found at the FDA's rules for dietary supplements.
The 5-Step Influencer Workflow for Regulated Brands
1. Creator Vetting
Brands need to find not only creators that fit their brand needs, but creators that convert and actually want to work with them. Brands need to vet content alignment, brand alignment, brand safety, audience alignment and demographics, all before they start negotiating rates.
2. Briefing
Once a deal is negotiated, brands build a brief that helps the creator know what content to make. This should include a solid list of do's and don'ts. Include all your best talking points along with compliance considerations. The best briefs are limited to 1-2 pages, which can be difficult for brands with heavy regulation.
3. Script Review
Many brands use a script review stage to ensure creator content is fully compliant with their regulations. It's a pre-approval step to help speed up the entire process.
4. Video Review
This stage occurs post-production. It's a video/audio compliance check to ensure the content is on-brand and doesn't break compliance and regulatory rules.
5. Performance Measurement
The best performance brands go beyond reach, impressions, likes and comments. They're looking at promo code redemptions, link clicks, DM volume, survey responses, and any data point that can inform if their campaigns are performing.
What to Look for in an Influencer Platform (Regulated Brand Checklist)
Regulated brands must find a platform that goes beyond creator discovery and campaign management (CRM). The biggest bottleneck and risk in influencer marketing for regulated brands is content review. Regulated brands need a platform that can automate content review, flag compliance issues, create an audit trail so feedback and revision requests are tracked properly. They should be MLR-friendly. Automated compliance and content review can save brands 40-100 hrs per month at scale. It's almost impossible to scale an influencer program without a platform with automated content review (script/video) capabilities.
That's where Passo comes in. Passo is the only influencer platform helping regulated brands automate their compliance and content review. The tool uses the latest AI models to watch every second of your influencer content and highlights issues that humans wouldn't catch. The benefits of this tool include increased speed of approvals, more accurate flagging of compliance and brand risk, and more time for marketers to do what humans are good at.
Common Mistakes Regulated Brands Make
Skipping script and video review: Many brands waive approvals and allow creators to post without someone on the brand team reviewing. This opens up tremendous risk from both compliance and brand safety. Often times, issues are caught after a creator publishes and are very hard to fix. Creators hate when revisions come after they've posted, which hurts the brand's reputation in the influencer marketing space.
No paper trail for compliance: It's extremely important to have a paper trail. When an auditor comes knocking, brands must have a record of all the compliance reviews and feedback they have given.
Using creators with known risks: Without proper brand safety checks, brands take the risk of working with creators that don't align with their brand and may open up compliance risk. The best brands are using brand safety automation tools like Passo or searching reddit to uncover if a creator has a shady history.
Regulated brands can't scale influencer programs without the frameworks and tools mentioned above. They take on enormous risk if they don't properly vet creators and their content, but doing so is a massive bottleneck and pain for everyone involved. Passo was built specifically to solve these workflows.