HomeInsightsASA rules that a claim to be the “largest online retailer” could not be substantiated solely by statistics relating to the number of website visits

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The ASA received a complaint that a claim on iSwegway.com’s Facebook page, which stated “The UK’s largest online Swegway retailer”, was misleading and could not be substantiated.

iSwegway.com provided statistics showing the number of visits to their website during 28 days between December 2016 and January 2017 was higher than those of four of their competitors.

Upholding the complaint, the ASA considered it was not clear what the comparison with other online Swegway retailers was based on, for example, turnover, product range, sales, etc, but considered it was nonetheless unlikely that consumers would interpret it to relate to the popularity of the website. The ASA therefore said that the data relating to the number of visits to the website was not sufficient to support the claim made in the ad.

In any event, even if the claim had clearly related to the popularity of the advertiser’s website, the ASA considered that because the statistics related to the number of website visits rather than to unique visitors to the website, and because it was not clear where those statistics originated from or if they were independently verified, they would not be sufficient to support such a claim.

The ASA concluded the claim was likely to mislead consumers because it did not make clear the basis of the comparison, and because the evidence provided was not sufficient to support any likely consumer interpretation of that claim. As such the ad breached CAP Code rules 3.1 (Misleading advertising), 3.7 (Substantiation) and 3.33 (Comparisons with identifiable competitors). To read ASA Ruling on Deltasourcing Traders Ltd (15 February 2017), click here.