3 ways ASA rulings change social media management for UK brands

What to take away

How ASA rulings under the CAP Code reach social media management

The Advertising Standards Authority writes and enforces the advertising codes in the UK. The advertising codes split into the broadcast code for television and radio and the non-broadcast code for everything else. Social media sits in the non-broadcast CAP Code.

That means a paid post, a gifted stay, a brand's own TikTok, an affiliate link and a whitelisted creator ad all fall under the same rulebook. What the CAP Code means for agency work is that it applies to commercial communications wherever they appear, not just where an ad slot was bought.

Rulings are the enforcement record. Each published case names the advertiser, quotes the rule breached and states what must change. The rulings database is public, searchable and indexed by sector, so a competitor's mistake is visible to your client's board within days.

Most social media cases arrive by complaint rather than monitoring. A single viewer, a rival brand or a pressure group can trigger a review. The ASA then asks the advertiser to substantiate, and the burden sits with the brand, not the complainant.

Agency teams often assume the platform's own ad policy is the ceiling. It is not. Meta, TikTok and Google enforce their own rules, and a campaign can clear those checks and still breach the CAP Code. The two systems run in parallel, and only one of them ends in a published adjudication.

For agencies, the practical consequence is that sign-off is a regulatory act. The person who approves a post is approving a claim, a disclosure and a targeting decision that the ASA can examine months later.

Ruling one: influencer disclosure failures and what changed

Influencer disclosure is the area where UK rulings have been most consistent and most unforgiving. The rule is simple: the commercial relationship must be obvious before a viewer engages with the content, not after.

The Boots and THG rulings

In January 2022 the ASA upheld complaints against Boots UK Ltd and THG Beauty Ltd, both over influencer posts that failed to disclose a commercial relationship clearly. The Boots ruling, dated 19 January 2022, concerned Instagram posts by Molly-Mae Hague for a beauty launch that were not obviously identifiable as ads.

The THG ruling, also dated 19 January 2022, concerned a paid partnership post by Louise Thompson for Lookfantastic that carried a label easy to miss in a crowded caption.

The ASA's reasoning was the same in both. The posts were marketing communications, they were controlled by the advertiser, and a viewer scrolling quickly would not have recognised them as advertising. The brand name and the platform's own partnership tool did not fix that on their own.

Label, position and contract controls

The rulings moved disclosure from a creator courtesy to an agency control. Contracts now need to specify the label, its position and the platforms it must appear on. The non-broadcast code sets the recognition principle that the label has to satisfy, and the label has to be understandable to an ordinary viewer scrolling quickly.

That has three consequences for social media management.

A workable disclosure policy covers paid, gifted, discounted, affiliate and ambassador relationships in one place, so nobody has to decide case by case at speed.

A gifted post with no label

Take a beauty brand that sends a creator a £180 gift set with no payment and no brief beyond a request to share it if she likes it. She posts a photograph with the brand tagged and the caption "obsessed with this". No label appears.

Under the CAP Code this is an ad, because the brand exercised control by supplying the product for coverage. Boots and THG both lost on that logic.

Ruling two: ad labelling and recognition in paid social

Ad labelling is a separate issue from influencer disclosure, and it trips up more experienced teams. The question is whether the audience recognises the content as advertising at all.

The Michael Kors and Müller rulings

The ASA upheld complaints against Michael Kors (UK) Ltd and Müller UK & Ireland Group LLP. The Michael Kors ruling, dated 13 March 2019, concerned an Instagram post by Bella Hadid that featured a Michael Kors handbag without an ad label.

The Müller ruling, dated 16 October 2019, concerned an Instagram post by Mrs Hinch that promoted Müller yogurt without a clear ad label.

In both cases the content read as editorial or as a creator's own view, while the commercial arrangement behind it was not clear to the audience. Fashion and food are both fast-moving categories where brands lean on creators and on editorial formats, and that is exactly where recognition fails.

Why recognition is the test

The CAP Code requires marketing communications to be obviously identifiable. On social platforms, where editorial and commercial content share the same feed, that identification has to be carried by the content itself. A small "paid partnership" line that the platform renders in grey text may not be enough if the rest of the post reads like independent opinion.

Formats that hide the commercial link

Three formats cause most of the trouble.

The common thread is borrowed trust. The content works because the audience does not read it as an ad, and that is what the rules prohibit.

What good labelling looks like

A label should be visible without interaction, in the same field of view as the claim, and in language the audience uses. "Ad", "advert" and "paid partnership with" work. A brand name alone does not. A hashtag that means nothing outside the industry does not.

Tools on the platform are useful, yet they do not resolve the matter. A paid partnership tag is evidence of intent, not a defence on its own. If the caption reads as a personal endorsement and the tag is faint, the ASA can still find the post unrecognisable as an ad.

For agencies running always-on paid social, the practical control is a labelling field in the content template that cannot be left blank. If the template requires a value, someone has to choose one, and that choice is reviewable.

Ruling three: claims and substantiation in agency-run content

Claims and substantiation is where social media management carries the most risk, because the evidence burden sits with the brand and the timeline is unforgiving.

The Colgate and Tesco Mobile rulings

The ASA upheld complaints against Colgate-Palmolive (UK) Ltd and Tesco Mobile Ltd. The Colgate ruling, dated 20 October 2021, concerned a claim for Colgate Total toothpaste that plaque was reduced by up to 24% more than a regular fluoride toothpaste.

The Tesco Mobile ruling, also dated 20 October 2021, concerned a claim that it was the only network not to raise prices mid-contract.

In both cases the issue was not the wording alone but the evidence behind it. The advertiser could not show, at the time of the complaint, that the claim was substantiated to the standard the CAP Code requires.

That is the recurring shape of claims cases. The claim is plausible, the intent is honest, and the file that should hold the proof is incomplete.

The standard

A claim must be true, capable of substantiation, and not misleading in context. Context includes the format. A short video that shows a result without qualification can mislead even if a longer page elsewhere explains the limits.

Comparative claims are stricter. Saying a product is the best, the fastest or the most effective invites the ASA to ask what it was compared against and on what basis. Superlatives without a named, verifiable basis are the most common single cause of upheld rulings.

Where agency content fails

Agency-run content fails in predictable places.

The rules and ethics apply to content an agency writes, scripts or edits, even when the client supplies the underlying claim. If you drafted it, you own part of the risk.

A substantiation file

Every claim in a campaign should have a matching entry in a file that holds the evidence, the date it was obtained and the person who verified it. A simple table is enough.

If a row cannot be filled, the claim comes out. That rule is easier to enforce than a debate about whether a phrase is puffery.

Sanctions and the non-compliant online advertisers list

ASA sanctions escalate. The first outcome is a published ruling, which requires the advertiser to withdraw or amend the ad and creates a public record. That alone damages trust with customers and retail partners.

If an advertiser keeps running the same non-compliant ads, the ASA moves to further sanctions. The sanctions page sets out the available measures, which include asking platforms and networks to remove paid ads and working with partners to restrict access.

The most visible step is the non-compliant online advertisers list. Advertisers placed on it have paid search ads bought against their own brand names, so anyone searching for them sees a warning that their ads break the rules. For a consumer brand, that is a direct hit on acquisition.

What triggers escalation

Escalation follows a pattern rather than a single mistake. An upheld ruling, then a failure to amend, then continued running of the same claims. The ASA also refers some cases to other regulators, including the Competition and Markets Authority for misleading pricing and the Information Commissioner's Office where data protection issues arise.

Why this matters to agencies

A client on the list is a client whose paid social cannot run properly, and whose organic content is under scrutiny. The reputational cost lands on the agency too, because the campaign was agency-run.

This is the point at which teams should rehearse risk scenarios before a client crisis rather than during one. Knowing who speaks to the client, who pulls the ads and who holds the substantiation file turns a week of panic into a morning of work.

What agencies should change in review and sign-off

The rulings point to a small number of changes that remove most of the risk. None of them require new tools.

Build a pre-launch checklist

Approval should sit with someone who understands the CAP Code, not only the client's brand guidelines. In larger agencies that is a compliance lead. In smaller ones it is a named senior person with the checklist in front of them.

Keep the record

Retain briefs, contracts, screenshots and evidence for the period the campaign runs and for a reasonable period after. If a complaint arrives, the file is the defence. If the file is thin, the ruling is likely to be upheld.

Train the people who write the captions

Most failures are written by people who have never read a ruling. A short internal session using Boots, THG, Michael Kors, Müller, Colgate or Tesco Mobile does more than a policy document nobody opens.

Common questions