Vindicta Digital warned by ASA over disregard of advertising code
Digital media agency Vindicta Digital has felt the wrath of the UK Advertising Standards Authority (ASA), after a complaint was upheld about a social media competition that was run by the firm.
The ad in question promoted the opportunity to win a hotel stay, outlining: “COMPETITION TIME … WIN A STAY FOR TWO @ THE SLIEVE DONARD HOTEL, NEWCASTLE CO. DOWN.”
The post also stated: “WINNER CRITERIA / HOW TO WIN: LIKE THE VINDICTA DIGITAL PAGE, TAG 3 + FRIENDS IN THE COMMENTS, SHARE THIS POST TO YOUR PAGE, WINNERS WILL BE PICKED – 13TH MAY.”
Following on from this, additional text was posted by Vindicta Digital on 24 April 2018 to the comments sections of the original Facebook post, detailing: “We’ve decided to give everyone another way of increasing their chances of winning this competition … LEAVE us a 5 STAR REVIEW on Facebook and DOUBLE YOUR ENTRY…”, a link to the review page was also included.
The complaint, which was upheld questioned whether the promotion’s urging of participants to leave a review, that would potentially not be genuine, would lead to the promotion being conducted unfairly.
The complaint was upheld, with the ASA deeming that promoters must conduct their promotions equitably, promptly and efficiently and be seen to deal fairly and honourably with participants and potential participants.
The ASA also lamented the lack of significant and efficient response from the digital media agency about the promotion, emphasising that it represented an apparent disregard of the code.
The advertising watchdog reminded them of their responsibility to provide a substantive response to ASA enquiries and told them to do so in future. As well urging them to ensure that in future promotions they did not encourage participants to provide favourable reviews as a condition of enhancing their chances of winning.
Source: SBC News
