3 years ago, Audrey Chippaux had never posted a photo on Instagram, let alone liked or commented on other people’s posts. She discovered this social network during a professional hiatus. While she is bored at home, she opens an Instagram account and sees her first influencers in her “discover” tab. She also discovers her ads, a “butcher shop” she comments on.
Then open your own account, Your stars in reality. Since then, she has studied the influencers’ posts daily to alert her followers if she detects scams or dangerous products, among other things. She highlights, for example, the promoted sites whose general conditions of sale are not adapted (because they are in English, they do not correspond to the products sold, etc.) or whose after-sales service is inaccessible.
His Instagram page has rarely been so up-to-date. Discussions about the sometimes unethical or even illegal business practices of influential people in France have reached new heights this year. For several months now, the rapper Booba has been using social media to denounce scams and give new visibility to the issue, at the cost of cyberbullying directed in particular against influencer agent Magali Berdah.
This question, however, is not new. For several years, the media has published surveys pointing out the abuses of the environment of influence, between CPF scams, promotion of defective or even fraudulent products and lack of transparency in paid associations. To do prevention with consumers, train influencers and sanction them if necessary, various actors are mobilizing in France.
The Ministry of Economy “particularly attentive”
At the state level, the DGCCRF, a service of the Ministry of Economy in charge of repressing fraud, carries out various controls on the activities of influencers. Among the problems studied by the administration are product placements where the commercial character is not indicated – the famous mentions “paid association” and “sponsored” – cases where delivery times or the promise of the product are not respected or of course the legality (or not) of the goods and services promoted by the influencers.
In France, not clearly indicating that content is sponsored is considered a misleading commercial practice, according to the consumer code. The maximum penalty provided is two years in prison and a fine of 300,000 euros.
To control these influencers, the DGCCRF relies in particular on the reports made on the SignalConso platform, accessible to anyone. Since the national launch of the platform in February 2020, it has received around 1,100 complaints from influencers, out of the more than 360,00 identified by the Ministry of Economy. It is not possible to know the number of influencers targeted, since several reports may refer to the same event. This is “one of the criteria” of the DGCCRF to carry out controls on a person or a company, but again, the service does not say how many controls have been carried out on influencers in recent years.
The most symbolic sanction of the DGCCRF to date is that he inflicted on Nabilla in July 2021. The influencer, in a story on Snapchat, promoted commercial services without indicating that it was paid advertising. He had to pay a fine of 20,000 euros for it. Beyond this case, it is difficult to know how many influencers have been sanctioned by the State. However, in 2021, 17% of the commercial content published by French influencers did not mention the existence of a societyaccording to the Professional Advertising Regulatory Authority (ARPP).
A diploma for influencer
To avoid ending up in this type of case, the advertising sector is organizing itself. In September 2021, ARPP, the regulatory body for professional advertising in France, launched a “responsible influence” certificate. It is issued after an online training course of approximately 3 hours, which covers the rules to be observed in gambling or health advertising, for example, and the main ethical principles that govern influencer marketing, such as the fight against greenwashing or the child protection.
In the program: videos, powerpoints and a test at the end. Check what the influencer has withheld: what should you review before collaborating with a new brand? What are the rules for the promotion of alcoholic beverages? You have to get 70% correct answers to have the certificate and currently, 4 out of 5 influencers pass the test.
If, despite obtaining the certificate, an influencer does not respect the legal or ethical framework in their product placements, the ARPP may refer the case to the Advertising Ethics Jury, made up in particular of magistrates and advertising professionals. The Jury issues public opinions on the complaints.
For an influencer nailed by this body, the sanction is above all “reputational damage, the ‘name and shame,'” according to Mohamed Mansouri. No certified influencer was referred to the jury. These sanctions are rather symbolic, a position assumed by the ARPP: “we do ethics, not criminality. When it is criminal, we can refer to the authorities, but each one remains within its perimeter”, declares Mohamed Mansouri. He admits that if all brands started requiring the certificate to collaborate with an influencer, the fear of having it taken away would probably be stronger.
Some companies are already doing it, like L’Oréal, the brand confirms to BFMTV.com. This approach “aims to encourage our partners to follow this virtuous spiral, to the benefit of the consumer,” he adds. Currently, around 170 influencers have this certificate.
In the financial sector, the AMF reports on Instagram
Other players focus on prevention for people who follow content creators online. In the financial sector, where influencers sometimes promise immediate and significant profits, in contravention of the precaution required by law, the Autorité des marchés financiers (AMF) monitors Snapchat and Instagram stories, thanks to tools based on artificial intelligence.
However, some influencers share “so-called good plans that often consist of copy and paste marketing strategies”. trade“, report Claire Castanet. Cette stratégie repose sur deux mythes, selon l’AMF: celui selon lequel on pourrait gagner beaucoup d’argent facilement, en quelques clicks, en investissant sur des produits en fait très risqués, et celui selon lequel on peut become businessman watching some videos.
Result: the person who follows these tips “loses a lot of money very quickly.” To avoid this, the AMF has launched campaigns on social networks (Instagram, TikTok) “that dismantle these arguments”: the idea is to reach the affected people first and foremost.
The AMF is also working with the ARPP to create a specialized certificate for financial influencers. The body can also pronounce sanctions against companies or financial professionals that have committed infractions. The amount of the fines can be counted in millions of euros. However, it does not sanction influencers, rather considered advertising professionals, and sanctioned as such by the DGCCRF.
Communication that remains inadequate
For Audrey Chippaux, the prevention campaign proposed by the AMF goes in the right direction, although “it is not certain” that the affected people follow the organization’s account on social networks.
He is followed by more than 150,000 people, and considers it important that they have access to free and easy-to-understand information about the excesses of influencers. Audrey Chippaux believes that the DGCCRF communication is “inappropriate”.
For her, public authorities must go through influencers to communicate, since they are aimed at the populations most affected by scams on social networks. But they should appeal to “good” influencers, those with responsible practices, according to Audrey Chippaux. In short, the means of control “exist” but can be “improved”.
Source: BFM TV
