Disclosure

If you recommend this and get paid when someone buys, say so. Every time, in the post itself.

That's the requirement, and it isn't ours — it comes from the same place as the sponsorship disclosure you already met in Form BV-01, and it applies to you as an affiliate for exactly the reason it applies to a paid creator: the audience is entitled to know that the recommendation is compensated, because it changes how much weight the recommendation deserves.

1The line

The sales page ships one. Use it:

I earn a commission if you buy through this link. I paid for the guide myself.

The first sentence is the disclosure. Plain, unhedged, and in words a reader doesn't have to decode. That last part matters more than it looks: the FTC's guidance notes that terms like "affiliate link" or "commissionable link" may not land, because consumers don't necessarily know what they mean. Wording like "I get commissions for purchases made through links in this post" is the kind it points to as sufficient. Our line is that, shortened.

The second sentence is not a disclosure requirement. It's a Module 4 move — provenance, volunteered. It tells the reader you're not reviewing a free copy, which is the next question a sceptical person asks.

And it becomes a lie the moment it isn't true. If you ever receive a complimentary copy, that sentence comes out and the fact goes in instead. A disclosure that contains one false sentence is worse than no second sentence.

2Where it goes

In the same place and the same format as the recommendation itself. That's the substance of the FTC's 2023 revision to its Endorsement Guides, and it closed the loopholes most people were relying on:

Which gives you the practical rules:

• In a video, say it out loud, and don't put it only in the caption.
• On-screen text as well as spoken is better, if the platform makes that easy.
• Early. Before the recommendation, not after it. Module 3's disclosure guidance already had you carrying it as its own beat ahead of the hook — same logic, same placement.
• Every post. Not the first one in a series.
• Platform tools are a supplement, not a substitute. Use the built-in paid partnership label if there is one, and say the line.

3Why we're not stating this as a fixed rule

You'll notice this section keeps saying the guidance notes rather than the law says, and that's deliberate — the same posture Form BV-01 takes, for the same reason.

Disclosure requirements differ by market and by platform, and they move. The guidance summarised here was checked on 2026-08-14 and describes the FTC's position, which governs the US. If you're somewhere else, a different regulator governs you, and every platform layers its own rules on top of whatever your regulator requires.

So the instruction is the one this guide gives everywhere it touches this subject: confirm the current requirement for your platform and your market yourself. Not because we're avoiding the question, but because a rule printed in a guide is a rule frozen on the day it was printed, and this is a live area.

(Sourcing note, in the spirit of §3: ftc.gov was unreachable from our verification environment on the date above, so the specifics here came from a search summary of the FTC's published guidance rather than a direct read. It's flagged for re-verification against the primary source before this ships. We'd rather you knew that than assumed a firmer check than happened.)

4Fill in a BV-01 for yourself

Module 6 §2 suggested this for your own products and it applies just as well here, with a wrinkle: as an affiliate you're the creator and the interested party at once. Nobody is handing you a guardrails document, so write your own.

The fields that matter for this:

• Disclosure requirement — the line above, and where it goes on each platform you post on.
• Claims you won't make — §3's right-hand column, in your own words, before you're in a comment thread being asked what you earn.
• Never sound like — worth doing honestly here, because the register this category defaults to is one you'd reject instantly from a client.

Ten minutes, once. It exists so that the decision about what you'll say is made somewhere other than in the moment when a post is doing well.

5The short version

Say that you're paid. Say it in the post. Say it in words that don't need decoding. Don't say anything about what the buyer will earn.

The first three are this section. The fourth is §3, and it's the one that actually gets people into trouble.