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The government, reportedly, will soon come up with mandatory guidelines for social media influencers, making them declare their collaboration with the products they endorse in their videos.
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“The department of consumer affairs is coming out with guidelines o social media influencers. It is creating do’s and don’ts for them. Social media influencers, who have large followers on social media platforms like Instagram and YouTube, are endorsing products after taking payments from the brands. As per the proposed guidelines, if social media influencers endorse any brand after taking money, they will have to declare their association with that brand,” said an official source, in a news statement.
The guidelines are said to be released within the next 15 days.
Nidhi Khare, chairperson of the central consumer protection authority, in a news report was quoted as saying, “We felt that in today’s digital world there are lot of social influencers who are involved in advertising of a product or a service and their role also needs to be delineated and brought under aspect.”
She also added that, “The influencers must provide disclaimers and will be treated as an endorser. Any violation will result in penalties starting from INR 10 lakh. We will be bringing in technological tools which will crawl into these digital creations and then depending on these violations such incidents can be reported.”
The guidelines, drafted by the department of consumer affairs, will be put in the public domain in the next couple of weeks.
According to the GroupM INCA’s India influencer marketing report, the Indian influencer marketing industry is estimated at INR 900 crore in 2021 and is expected to reach at INR 2200 crore in 2025 at a CAGR of 25 per cent.