The Digital Services Act raised the bar for transparency on so-called “Online Platforms allowing distant contact with traders” — i.e. online marketplaces. If your legal team has advised that you’re at risk of being recognised as an Online Platform by your national Digital Services Coordinator, take a look at our recommendations below.
Sounds familiar? Read on!
Need more info? Navigate to the first article in this series for more clarity about the regulatory context of these reflections.
Under the DSA, advertisements are defined as “information designed to promote the message of a legal or natural person, irrespective of whether to achieve commercial or non-commercial purposes, and presented by an online platform on its online interface against remuneration specifically for promoting that information” (see Art. 3(r)).
Sounds like a sponsored listing? To us too.
Have a look at how the tools presented below can help you ensure that sponsored listings on your digital marketplace offer the necessary level of advertising transparency.
AdChoices Icon
This discreet, interactive consumer-facing tool clearly indicates that a given listing has been boosted to appear at the top of the search results. A roll-out localised ad marker appears on hover, and more information about the company behind that listing becomes available in one click.
Note: the size of the Icon was increased in the example above for the purpose of demonstration.
Enhanced Transparency Page
Avoid fragmented, inconsistent user experience by ensuring that all sponsored listings are complemented by a uniform, dedicated space displaying all of the required transparency information — and more, if you so wish. Use the template you see below or engage the DSPs and CMPs you work with to ensure a consistent approach.
Choice & Control
If applicable, you need to ensure that consumers have a say in changing the parameters used to target a given listing to them. If you’re using profiling parameters, you can easily integrate with the YourOnlineChoices.eu portal to give your consumers an accessible way to express their preference.
Curious what this could look like on your property? Look no further than the animation below:
Interested in learning more about these tools, and how they can be integrated into your platform
to deliver DSA-level information to consumers?
EDAA’s Advanced Advertising Transparency Programme is here to help!
Contact us at aatp@edaa.eu for more info,
or apply for participation here:
