Offers that pull,
and still hold up after they print.

Yes, where the old price was real. 16 C.F.R. 233.1(a) says a former price gives a legitimate basis for a comparison when it is the actual, bona fide price at which the item was offered to the public on a regular basis for a reasonably substantial period, and that a price set artificially high so a reduction can be advertised is fictitious rather than bona fide. The practical version: keep a dated price history. If the higher figure was never really charged, run the offer without the comparison — it still pulls. We take the same "keep the record" position on direct mail.

To holding the price of whatever the customer has to buy. 16 C.F.R. 251(b)(1) explains that a "free" offer rests on a regular price for the item that must be purchased, and that the buyer pays nothing for the free article and no more than the regular price for the other. So raising the paid item to cover the free one is the specific move the guide addresses. Conditions belong with the offer where they will be read. The same "put the condition where the decision happens" thinking runs through our landing page work.

Only if it does not say whose lifetime. 16 C.F.R. 239.4 addresses "lifetime" and similar representations, and where an advertisement uses one to describe duration it should disclose the life the representation refers to, clearly enough to be noticed and understood by prospective purchasers. In practice naming the term makes the ad stronger — a reader can picture "as long as you own the system" and cannot picture "lifetime". Specific beats vague here, the same way it does in the copy we write.

You can run an advertorial, and it should be recognizable as advertising. The Federal Trade Commission's native advertising guidance covers print as well as digital, and the question it turns on is whether an ordinary reader can tell what they are looking at. That is a layout decision before it is a legal one — the label belongs where reading begins rather than in small type at the foot. A clearly labeled advertorial with genuinely useful content still works, because the credibility comes from the substance. Related: content strategy.

It is fine when the advertised offer is one you will actually sell. 16 C.F.R. Part 238 addresses bait advertising — an alluring offer made without a genuine intention to sell it, used instead to switch the customer to something else. A genuine entry price with honest availability is ordinary advertising. A price nobody is ever sold at is the thing the guides describe. Since it also poisons the first call, it is a sales problem before it is a compliance one — see what happens after the lead arrives.

We cut them, and not mainly for legal reasons. Broad superlatives occupy the most valuable line on the page and carry almost no persuasive weight, because readers discount them automatically. The general expectation that objective claims be supportable sits in the FTC's advertising guidance for small business, with the underlying prohibition at 15 U.S.C. 45. Replace the superlative with a checkable fact and the ad gets stronger. That is the same test we apply on competitor claims.

It can. 16 C.F.R. Part 240 covers advertising allowances and merchandising payments, and the conditions attached to how those programs are offered and used travel with the money. Practically: get the co-op requirements in writing before layout, because they often dictate logo treatment, claim language and where the money can be spent. Finding out after the sign-off is signed means either losing the funding or reprinting. Related: how we handle terms on any buy.

Only if it meets the standard, and the standard is stricter than most people expect. The Made in USA Labeling Rule governs unqualified claims, and the FTC publishes guidance on complying with it. A qualified claim describing what is actually assembled or sourced domestically is usually both accurate and more interesting than the blanket version. Environmental claims carry their own guides at 16 C.F.R. Part 260 — worth reading before "eco-friendly" goes on a page. The same specificity test applies to every claim we put in written copy.

By building the measurement into the artwork before it goes to press. A phone number or short landing address unique to that publication and insertion date, insertion dates recorded, and a defined window either side so response is compared against a real baseline rather than a busy week. Get a tear sheet showing the ad as published and check position and date against what you bought. Response numbers in circulation for print are survey estimates, not counts, which is why we publish none — the reasoning is on our conversion rate optimization page, and the general substantiation expectation sits in FTC advertising guidance.

Often yes, and we will say so when it is not. Print works where the publication's readership overlaps your service area, the offer is simple enough to be understood in one pass, and the household you want still reads something physical. It works badly when the conditions attached to the offer are too long to print legibly, or when the readership sits mostly outside the area you serve. Claims read on paper carry the same substantiation expectation as anywhere else — see 15 U.S.C. 52. Start with an honest read of where your demand sits, which is what the A.R.C. Report is for.