Here at Carusele, we often find ourselves in between an influencer who wants to do informal, conversational content to really inspire their followers, and a legal team who wants to make sure influencers use formal, precise language to keep their brand out of trouble. While it can be difficult to find the happy-medium between these two asks, it is possible.

In our experiences with these situations, we go through a sort of checklist as to which way should we lean. But what it really comes down to what's required versus what's nice to have.

There are many times that a brand has to be specific with their marketing - for this situation we'll use the example of naming the brand's product within a blog post or social shares. Legal teams are looking for formal language to be used because of marketing requirements like FTC regulations. For instance, if you have a series of products that has one brand attribute that you want to talk about and a similarly named series of product that don't have said attribute, if you're not clear about which product you're talking about then the influencer is making unsupported claims across your whole suite of products. So that's a simple example of when it's a requirement for the influencers to be formal, even if it sounds a little clunky.

Alternatively, other times we see legal teams requesting formalities because that's their practice for print advertising or when they refer to themselves in an email or television ad. In those cases, it's likely best to go with the conversational, less formal way of speaking. Think about it, if you're going to recommend a product to your friend, chances are you're not going to use a 10 word product name, but rather tell them how good the product was and send them a picture of the packaging. Hence why the influencer should follow that same informal, conversational tone.

If you ever find yourself stuck in the middle of conversational versus formal language, or other situations between your influencer and legal team, look at what is required legally versus what's nice to have. That's where the debate should lie.

If you need any developing other aspects of your campaigns, check out our influencer marketing checklist to make sure you're buttoned up for the next campaign.