Are Zhiling Lin and Liying Zhao in trouble?

According to The Paper on August 22th, Zhejiang Jinhua market supervision administration fined an agent of the brand ‘Yanruyu’ a million yuan for false publicity. The ‘Yanruyu’ is called global collagen sales champion product that can absorb 98% of the collagen passed the stimulant test of the government, the international superstar Zhiling Lin, was once a well-known agent for the brand. However, now the local regulator found that it was just plain blueberry juice, what about our due of ‘full collagen’?

Now, ‘Yanruyu’ is exposed and its incumbent brand agent Liying Zhao is the first to bear the brunt which she has been pushed onto the cusp of ‘fraud’ and ‘compensation’.

Advertising endorsement is one of the star general sources of income. Not only Zhiling Lin and Liying Zhao, in fact many stars have suffered the loss of advertising endorsements. For instance, Benshan Zhao had been accused because of Beijirong thermal underwear ads, the household Jackie Chan’s Bawang shampo case, even the recent feture Honglei Sun may be fined hundreds of millions for advertising the ‘Guazi’ used cars. To turn stars into quality inspectors is difficult, but after all, most customers being cheated by the advertisements was result in the star effect. Take ‘Yanruyu’ as an example, many customers chose to buy the products are not because they know about the products well, but only because they believed in the stars in which they hope to achieve the effect of ‘collagen full, healthy and beautiful’ as Yingbao said. Therefore, the star as an advertising spokesperson, it is excusable to assume the proper responsibility for the advertisement.

For this kind of situation, the new "Advertising Law" adds a new responsibility clause for advertising spokespersons: advertising spokespersons should recommend and prove goods and services in advertisements according to facts, in accordance with the provisions of this Law and relevant laws and administrative regulations, also they should not recommend or prove goods or services they have not used or received. Therefore, after the publication of the new Advertising Law, stars can only endorse the things they have tried,  which means that Zhixaing Luo, Youjia Lin, Bolin Chen and other male stars can’t endorse sanitary napkins anymore. Because, before publicizing, try first!

In addition to the above prohibitive provisions, article 55 of the advertising law also stipulates the joint and several liability of advertising spokespersons. To put it simply, if the false advertisement endorsed by advertising spokespersons causes damage to consumers' life and health, they should assume joint and several liability unconditionally. As for other false advertisements, if the advertising spokespersons know or should known that the advertisements are false but still endorse and cause damages to consumers, for which they should also bear joint and several liabilities. 

At this point, we are done with the responsibility of advertising spokespersons. Here, I have three advertising tips for you~

First, some words are forbidden in advertisements! According to the article ‘Prohibited Words in Xinhua News Agency News Report’, commonly used words such as ‘most, first, national and world-class’ these gradability words, ‘top, best, perfect’ and other extreme words, brand words like ‘famous brand, trump card’ can not be used in advertisements. So next time, when we confront the ad that including ‘every potter praises his pot’ which boast more than the Wang Po done belongs the false ad, don’t trust!

Second, health products are not allowed to have advertising spokespersons! I'm not being ridiculous, it is written in the eightieth law of the Advertising Law. Degang Guo once get into trouble because of advertising a health care product named ‘Zangmipaiyou’. Moreover, the advertisement of health food should clearly indicate that ‘this product cannot replace medicine’, sincerely hope that there will be no more idiots wishing to cure diseases by eating health food!

Third, advertising in the WeChat Moments can not be forwarded freewheelingly! According to the new ‘Advertising Law’, natural people can also become advertisement publishers which means that whether they charge advertising fees or not, as long as they directly or indirectly introduce the goods or services they sell, they constitute the advertising behavior. At this moment, if the forwarding is exactly false advertising and caused buyers' rights and interests damage, while the publisher can not provide the advertiser's real information, sorry, the law stipulates that the publisher should give the money first.

Finally, warmly reminds~ Everyone is the self-Media in the information world, please do not randomly forward the advertising information you do not know well. Stars, as the main spokespersons of advertisements, should shoulder social responsibility, before advertising widely, try first and inform later!