Blogpost 4 – Regulation of Advertisements

What do you think Regulation means?

Your Task this week:1) Advertising needs to be regulated. Regulation takes place through two main bodies, the ASA and OFCOM.

• Explain why the regulation of television adverts is important • Explain the role and purpose of ASA/Ofcom• Explain which areas of advertising are a particular concern to the ASA• Explain the two questions the ASA asks of a particular advert• Explain how the ASA decides whether an advertisement is appropriate

2) Choose two controversial advertisements that you think raise important issues and explain in detail:

• What the issues are.• What the ASA said.• What your own personal opinion is.• You should aim to choose advertisements that raise different issues such as:• objectification of women; promotion of unhealthy food; providing misleading information; the manipulation of

children ; animal cruelty ; Racism.

What does advertising do?

Why do advertisers think it is worth spending so much money on it?

UK advertising spend passes £20bn as growth hits five-year high

Digital drives 7.5% increase in UK advertising spend in 2015

Television accounts for a quarter of that spend

• Advertising helps promote and• stimulate competition.• Advertising draws attention to a product or

service.• Advertising tells consumers how much things

cost.• Advertising keeps consumers up to date• with new developments.• Advertising makes us aware of different brands.• Advertising helps fund media.• There are 20,000 jobs in the advertising industry.• Advertising helps fund culture and sport.• Advertising helps businesses make a profit.• Advertising tells consumers what things• they must have.• Advertising helps change society’s behaviour.• Advertising makes us loyal to certain brands.• Advertising tells us where to access• products and services.• Advertising warns people about• dangerous activities.• Advertising can be funny and entertaining.

Why is regulation important?

https://www.asa.org.uk/Rulings/Adjudications/2015/7/Protein-World-Ltd/SHP_ADJ_300099.aspx#.WC3odLKLTIU

Why Regulation is important.Advertising is an essential part of modern life and a moderneconomy – informing consumers about the things availableto them, giving them vital information, and persuading themin a lively way about the merits of particular products andservices. It’s very important that this information isaccurate, and doesn’t mislead, and can be trusted by theconsumers who see or hear it.

Ofcom• The Office of Communications, commonly known as Ofcom, is the

government-approved regulatory and competition authority for the broadcasting, telecommunications and postal industries of the United Kingdom.• Ofcom has wide-ranging powers across the television, radio, telecoms

and postal sectors. It has a statutory duty to represent the interests of citizens and consumers by promoting competition and protecting the public from what might be considered harmful or offensive material. Some of the main areas Ofcom presides over are licensing, research, codes and policies, complaints, competition and protecting the radio spectrum from abuse

Ofcom• When dealing with advertisements, Ofcom will often direct you to

the ASA which specifically regulates advertisements.

• For distinction level work, go to Ofcom.org.uk. Type advertising into the search bar, and read a few of the top articles. Embed some of what you learn in your answer.

Ensuring that advertising can be trusted is where theAdvertising Standards Authority comes in. The ASAstarted in 1962, and its job is: to ensure that advertising in all forms of media – from newspapers,magazines and billboards through to television, radio andthe internet – is legal, decent, honest and truthful. If an advert fails those tests, then the advertising is either amendedor withdrawn.

The work of the Advertising StandardsAuthority (ASA) covers advertisements in:

• • Magazines and newspapers

• • Radio and TV• • Television shopping channels• • Posters• • Cinema• • Direct mail (advertising sent through the• post and addressed to you personally)• • Internet, including a company’s own• marketing on its own website or social• networking page, as well as in paid-for space• • Leaflets and brochures• • Commercial email and mobile messages• • CD ROMs, DVDs, videos and faxes• • Sales promotions (special offers, prize draws• and competitions)

The following products have specific rules about how they can be advertised …

•Alcohol•Gambling• Food and soft drinks•Health and beauty products• Tobacco

Why?

There are also Code rules that relate to:

• Harm and offence• Environmental claims• Racism• Children and advertising• Scheduling ads at appropriate times• Displaying ads in appropriate places• Misleading claims

Accurate or Offensive?The Advertising Codes ASA apply to adverts concentrateparticularly on two things.

1) Is the advert inaccurate ormisleading?

2) Might it cause offence to people seeing it, or could it cause harm to anyone, especially to children?

Role of the ASAThe Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) works to makesure that all UK advertising is legal, decent, honest andtruthful.

It is funded by a levy on advertising space, butoperates independently from advertisers and the government.

Role of ASAAs well as proactively checking ads from the many millionsthat appear every year in the UK, the ASA acts on complaintsto make sure that consumers are protected from misleading,harmful or offensive ads.

Even a single complaint can lead to a formal investigation and an ad being withdrawn.

In 2011:

The ASA handled 31,458 complaints about 22,397different adverts.

They judged that 4,591 ads had to be either changed or withdrawn.

Nearly 94% of the complaints came from members of the public.

Who writes the rules?• The ASA judges ads against the UK Advertising Codes.*

• The Advertising Codes are written by the advertising industry through the Committee of Advertising Practice (CAP) and the Broadcast Committee of Advertising Practice (BCAP).

The members of these committees are drawn from the main industry bodies representing advertisers, agencies and media owners.

The Advertising Codes• The Advertising Codes contain wide-ranging rules designed to ensure

that advertising does not mislead, harm or offend and is socially responsible, whatever the product being advertised.

The Codes reflect the law and in places go well beyond it. The Codes also contain specific rules for certain products and marketing techniques to cover…..

What is covered • Alcoholic drinks, • Health and beauty claims,• Marketing to children, • Medicines, • Financial products, • Environmental claims, • Gambling,• Direct marketing and prize promotions.

• The ASA works on the principle that advertisers must adhere to the spirit as well as the letter of the rules, making it almost impossible for advertisers to find loopholes.

Who judges the ads?The ASA Council is the jury responsible for decidingwhether ads have breached the Advertising Codes.

Two-thirds of the Council members are independent of the advertising industry and the remaining members have a professional background in the advertising or media sectors.

Collectively they offer a wide range of skills and experiences, representing perspectives across society, including young people, families, charities and consumer groups.

Two bodies with a shared goal to keepadvertising legal, decent, honest and truthful.

•CAP – writes the advertising codes

•ASA - assesses if ads breach the Advertising Codes

You be the judge• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aG6dcvd1PEY

The Advert For Paddy Power• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ispFw6THxtg

• What do you think? Why?

What happened?• 1,089 viewers objected to this ad.

• 220 viewers objected that the ad was offensive to blind people; and 1,070 viewers objected that the ad was offensive and harmful, because it might encourage or condone cruelty to animals

ASA Verdict• Paddy Power plc – July 2010• Not upheld• The ASA said it was not offensive in itself to create an advert referring to people with a disability.• Paddy Power said it featured an action “so unlikely that it was absurd”.• Paddy Power said the advert did not show the cat being kicked or suffering any violence or

cruelty. It was clearly and deliberately shown to be unharmed at the end of the item.• Paddy Power had chosen a blind football match to promote a lesser-known sport – the World

Blind Football Championships were going to take place in 2010. • Paddy Power produced a letter of support from the manager of the England Blind Football

Team.• All the players in the ad were actual blind football players, many of whom had represented the

national side.

The ASA’s final decision was….

• 1. The action in the ad would be interpreted by most viewers as a humorous depiction of a fictional situation, with the humour derived from surreal and improbable circumstances, when an unforeseeable and accidental action occurred.

• 2. It was unlikely to be seen by most viewers as malicious or implying that blind people were likely to cause harm to animals whilst playing football.

• 3. The ad was unlikely to be seen as humiliating, stigmatising or undermining to blind people and was unlikely to cause serious or widespread offence.