A new influencer training course in Germany aims to increase awareness and understanding amongst KOLs of the country’s myriad advertising laws, and infuse greater transparency into the influencer marketing industry.
The German Advertising Council (Werberat) has launched an online influencer training course that aims to increase awareness of the country’s advertising laws, and infuse greater transparency into the influencer marketing industry.
The 90-minute online course is available to influencers, agencies and brands. It covers both German and European advertising laws as they pertain to influencer marketing and social media.
Developed in cooperation with the European Advertising Standards Alliance (EASA), the Training by Werberat course aims to help KOLs, content creators, brands and agencies avoid issues arising from incorrectly labelled content, misleading content or unlawful advertising.
Divided into six subsections, the course covers correct labelling of influencer/brand collaboration content, German Advertising Council rules and misleading advertising.
Also covered are special requirements for advertising alcohol and food, and the protection of minors in advertising.
With the launch of Training by Werberat, Germany becomes the third country after France and the Netherlands to deliver a comprehensive resource designed to help influencers stay on the right side of advertising laws when publishing brand collaboration content.
German Advertising Council (Werberat) Head of European of ZAW Affairs Stefanie Lefeldt says the new influencer training was inspired by France’s Certificate of Responsible Influence, and responds to the challenge presented by Germany’s fractured advertising regulatory landscape.
“Germany does not have a law specifically for influencer marketing. Neither is there just one law for advertising. There are so many different rules and regulations; the training course aims to provide an overview of all of them,” comments Stefanie Lefeldt.
“Previously, there was no single website in Germany that displayed all the advertising rules which apply to influencers. The training course rectifies that, providing a one-stop-shop for influencers.”
Kolsquare Founder and CEO Quentin Bordage congratulated the German Advertising Council on the creation of the influencer training course, which he said would contribute to a more robust, responsible and sustainable influencer marketing sector.
Kolsquare has moved quickly to add the Training by Werberat label to its platform, which will be automatically displayed on the KOL profile pages of creators who have successfully completed the training.
“This small addition to our platform is a big win for our users who can now see very quickly if a potential KOL partner is aware of the various advertising rules that apply to the sector,” comments Kolsquare Founder and CEO Quentin Bordage.
“In addition to our proprietary Compliance Score feature which analyses the level of influencer compliance with advertising laws, the Training by Werberat label provides strong assurance to brands and agencies that influencers will act responsibly.”
The Germany influencer training is completed through an online web portal. The course takes around 90 minutes to complete and influencers who sign up to the course may stop and start the training as time constraints require.
Course participants who achieve a 75% pass rate or higher will receive proof of completion and be publicly named on the Werberat website.
To date, 37 influencers have successfully completed the training course.
The course will be offered free of charge to the first 50 influencer applicants, after which the training will be billed at €50 + VAT. Special group prices may be available for brands and agencies wanting to register employees to complete the training.
“We have included a lot of diverse content in the course, including video and practical elements, to make it as accessible as possible,” comments the German Advertising Council’s Stefanie Lefeldt, adding that the course also includes a section designed to help creators evaluate the responsibility of potential partner companies.
During a three month period to mid-March 2024, Kolsquare analysed all Posts and Reels published on Instagram by creators with more than 30% of their audience in Germany, of which there were 1.2M.
Of the 1.2M Instagram Posts and Reels published by 93K German creators, 7.5% — or 70,405 contents — were identified as sponsored content. Of those, 75% were found to be compliant with German labelling rules.
“In Germany, I think we are quite advanced in terms of people understanding they must disclose when a post is advertising, but there is a lot of ground to catch up on issues and laws around misleading or potentially harmful advertising,” comments Stefanie Lefeldt from the German Advertising Council.
“Recently there has been a lot of debate about legalising cannabis, which has led to a lot of people thinking that you can advertise it, which you can’t. We saw that amongst the initial group of trainees, a few people got this wrong. It’s an example of the kind of practical case influencers will find in the course.”
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Germany is known for its stringent approach to consumer protection, and this extends to its advertising laws. Under these regulations, any form of advertising—whether it's a paid partnership, sponsored post, or product placement—must be explicitly labelled as such.
Although Germany does not have a specific law for influencer marketing, the Interstate Media Treaty (Medienstaatsvertrag) and the Telemedia Act establish advertising rules in Germany, including internet advertising and encompassing influencer marketing.
In addition, several high-profile court rulings have established rules for advertising transparency of sponsored influencer content. In 2022, the Unfair Competition Law was also amended to specifically address the issue of surreptitious advertising in influencer marketing content.
Accepted labels for influencer advertising content are #werbung (advertisement) and #anzeige (publicity), which must be mentioned at the beginning of a post or video, and in the description.
Although German law does not specifically address the question of influencers promoting potentially harmful products such as cosmetic surgery, gambling, medical and health products, a series of individual laws pertaining to advertising in these sectors apply equally to influencer marketing. Advertising tobacco products on the internet, for example, is generally prohibited.
The protection of minors in advertising is covered under the Interstate Treaty on the Protection of Minors in the Media (JMStV); as a general principle, advertising must not directly exhort minors to buy products or services by exploiting their inexperience.
Kolsquare is Europe’s leading Influencer Marketing platform, a data-driven solution that allows brands to scale their KOL Marketing strategies and implement authentic partnerships with KOLs (Key Opinion Leaders). Kolsquare’s technology enables marketing professionals to easily identify the best Content Creators profiles by filtering their content and audience, and to build and manage their campaigns from A to Z, including measuring results and benchmarking performance against competitors. Kolsquare has built the largest community of influencer marketing experts in the world, and offers hundreds of customers (Coca-Cola, Netflix, Sony Music, Publicis, Sézane, Sephora, El Corte Inglés, Lacoste, …) the latest Big Data, AI and Machine Learning technologies to drive inspiring partnerships, tapping into an exhaustive network covering 100% of KOLs with more than 5,000 followers in 180 countries on Instagram, TikTok, Twitter, Facebook and YouTube. As a Benefit Company, Kolsquare has been pioneering Responsible Influence by championing transparency, ethical practices, and meaningful collaborations to inspire change.
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