Is Your Marketing Legal? 10 Claims That Might Catch the Eye of Consumer Protection Authorities
Just a few years ago, many companies treated marketing communications as an arena of immense creative freedom. Today, the landscape has completely shifted. The Office of Competition and Consumer Protection (UOKiK) is increasingly scrutinizing not only the product or service itself, but how it is advertised.
Regulators are no longer just looking out for blatant fraud. Everyday market practices are increasingly falling under the microscope:
- advertising slogans and sales copy,
- "eco" buzzwords and quality declarations,
- influencer communications across social media,
- and claims (statements) that the entrepreneur cannot unequivocally prove.
In practice, this means one thing: if you communicate something as a fact, you must be ready to prove it.
Here are 10 of the most popular types of claims that are most likely to draw regulatory interest during an audit:
1. "The best," "number 1," "the most effective"
These are among the highest-risk slogans. The average consumer is likely to perceive them as objective statements, the result of independent research, or a competitive advantage backed by hard market data. If a company uses slogans like "the best supplement" or "number 1 in the country," it must possess the substantiating evidence (e.g., consumer surveys, sales reports) before launching the campaign.
2. "Natural"
This is one of the most frequently abused words. Although general regulations rarely define "naturalness" explicitly, consumers attach a specific meaning to it (pure, chemical-free). If a product contains synthetic ingredients, has undergone heavy technological processing, or if the word "natural" refers only to a tiny fraction of the ingredients, the claim will be