Affiliate marketing is a great way to make some extra cash, but did you know that you’re required to add this *one* thing to your posts when you share affiliate links? That’s right, you must include an affiliate disclosure! We’re here to shed some light on what an affiliate disclosure is, why it’s necessary, and how to add one to your blog posts.
Affiliate link disclosures are an FTC-mandated practice. These disclosures are important as they one, ensure fair business practices, and two, provide transparency to your readers. If you fail to include this disclosure, you can actually face legal trouble. ? Never fear, we are here to help you learn how to add these disclosures to your WordPress site. And with our plugin, Tasty Links, adding disclosures is as easy as pie! ?
Before we dive in, let’s cover the three best practices that make an affiliate disclosure FTC compliant.
✅ Place disclosures in obvious areas.
This means, don’t link to it in the footer or hide it on a separate page. We recommend either adding it to the top of your blog posts or placing a reference next to your links (in the recipe card, e.g. all-purpose flour (affiliate link) ).
✅ Be proactive.
If you’re endorsing a product and getting paid for it through affiliate links, always share a disclosure. But, if you’re not sure whether or not a page or a post requires a disclosure, it doesn’t hurt to add one anyway. You’ll never be penalized for adding disclosures!
✅ Use clear language.
Make it super obvious that there are “affiliate links” on your blog. Your readers may not know what an affiliate link is, which is why we recommend using simple language such as “This post contains affiliate links for which I may receive compensation” so there is no confusion.
Keeping these best practices in mind, we created the Tasty Links plugin to make it easier for you to add affiliate disclosures to your own blog! Here’s a little step-by-step guide for adding disclosures.
1. Create a new Tasty Link.
First things first, you’ll need to create a Tasty Link. Follow this helpful guide to learn how to create a link. On this page, you’ll need to turn “Append disclosure” to “On” in order to automatically apply disclosure settings to that link. Remember that the disclosure setting is set on a per-link basis, so it’s turned on or off for each specific keyword.
2. Configure the disclosure settings.
After you create a link, you’ll want to configure the disclosure settings. To do that navigate to Tasty Links > Settings from your WordPress dashboard.
3. Decide where you want your disclosure message to display.
On the settings page you’ll need to choose whether you want your disclosure message to appear at the top of your blog posts (example 1) or next to each affiliate link (example 2.) Whichever option you choose, the disclosure will automatically show up for any links that you have added via the Tasty Links plugin.
4. Write your disclosure text.
You'll need to adjust your disclosure text depending on where you want your disclosure to be located. If you decide to have it appear after each link, you’ll want the disclosure text to say something like “affiliate” or “affiliate link.” If the disclosure appears after the post content, the disclosure text should say something like “This post contains affiliate links. I may receive commission from those links, at no extra cost to you.”
5. Add your ShareASale Affiliate ID (optional.)
The final setting on this page allows you to add your WP Tasty affiliate ID. Doing so will automatically populate the following call-to-action at the bottom of your Featured Links blocks. If someone clicks on that block and signs up for the plugin, you’ll get paid!
If you aren’t an affiliate yet, you can sign up here! As a WP Tasty affiliate, you’ll receive 30% commission (plus 30% for every month they remain a paying member) whenever any of your site visitors sign up via your link.
6. Styling the disclaimer (optional.)
Navigate to Appearance > Customize > Additional CSS section of your WordPress dashboard. From there, you can target the disclaimer class for styling.
Here’s an example of styling the disclosure text.
.tasty-links-general-disclaimer {
color: aquamarine;
opacity: 0.8;
}7. Additional styling settings (optional.)
If you're interested in moving your affiliate disclosure to the very top of your post, above the Tasty Recipes Quick Links (Jump to Recipe and/or Print links) you can use this filter to add it in.
Just add the following snippet to your theme's functions.php file:
/**
* Move the Tasty Links disclaimer above Tasty Recipes' Jump To links.
*/
add_filter(
'the_content',
function( $content ) {
if ( false === stripos( $content, '<div class="tasty-links-general-disclaimer">' ) ) {
return $content;
}
// Remove the existing disclaimer text.
$content = preg_replace( '#<div class="tasty-links-general-disclaimer">(.+)</div>#Us', '', $content );
// Add the disclaimer text again.
$content = Tasty_Links\Frontend::append_or_prepend_disclosure_to_content( $content );
return $content;
},
1000
);See what we mean? Adding an affiliate disclosure really is easy when you use Tasty Links! ? As always, if you ever need help with any of our plugins you can reach out to our support team. We also have a WP Tasty Help Center where you’ll be able to find answers to many of your questions too!
Note: This post was written to specifically address affiliate disclosures found on websites, rather than social media platforms. Affiliate disclosure guidelines for other sources, such as social media, will be different than what we have shared above.
Interested in Tasty Links? ?
If you’ve been tossing around the idea of giving Tasty Links a try, this update might just make you pull the trigger! We’re always looking for new ways to improve Tasty Links, and you can be confident that we’ll keep supporting you on your blogging journey.
Take a look at all Tasty Links has to offer.
Also, don’t forget about our 14-day money-back guarantee! Trying Tasty Links is risk-free, and we think you’ll really like it!