The post, seen on 21 December 2022, featured a video promoting Visit Qatar and was captioned: "Time spent eating my bodyweight in the kitchen! That’s a wrap for Qatar, been great filming behind the scenes and meeting so many locals!”
The text accompanying the post included "#VisitQatar" and "#ad". However, when viewed on a mobile device, these hashtags were obscured requiring users to click or tap the "more" button to make them visible, prompting the complainant to challenge whether the post was "obviously identifiable" as a marketing communication.
The ASA said the post fell under its remit owing to Ferdinand’s commercial relationship with Visit Qatar, which saw him paid to promote the country’s tourism industry using Instagram, with the authority adding Ferdinand and Visit Qatar were jointly responsible.
In its defence, Qatar Tourism – trading as Visit Qatar – acknowledged the label wasn’t prominent enough, and stressed it had liaised with Ferdinand’s representatives to make the label on the post clearer. In addition, it said it would ensure all future posts would be more prominently labelled.
Representatives for Ferdinand said they believed the guidelines had been followed, adding the #ad label had been used following previous advice from Instagram.
The ASA ruled that because the ad did not make clear its commercial intent upfront, it was not obviously identifiable as a marketing communication, thus breaching its code. Qatar Tourism, Visit Qatar and Rio Ferdinand have been told the ad must not appear again in the form complained of.
In addition, it said the parties involved must ensure future ads were obviously identifiable as marketing communications, and that identifiers such as #ad were clear and prominent.
