The creator economy’s next metric is compliance

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TL;DR:

India’s influencer marketing boom is colliding with a compliance failure: 97.3% of 1,609 influencer ads processed in FY2025-26 needed changes. Brands must treat disclosure, claim substantiation and category legality as core brand-safety controls, not post-publication clean-up.

Article:

India’s influencer marketing boom is colliding with a compliance failure. In FY2025-26, the Advertising Standards Council of India processed 1,609 influencer advertisements; 97.3% needed modification, while more than 54% promoted categories prohibited by law or subject to advertising restrictions. The case volume rose from 1,015 the previous year, making creator governance a brand-safety issue rather than a cosmetic disclosure problem.

The risk extends beyond hidden sponsorships. Illegal betting generated 54% of influencer violations, followed by personal care at 16.9%, electronics and consumer durables at 7.9%, food and beverages at 6.3%, and fashion and lifestyle at 4.3%. Regulators also found exaggerated outcomes, unsupported health benefits and pseudo-scientific claims in beauty and food promotions.

ASCI chairman Sudhanshu Vats warned of “the normalisation of non-compliance as a post-publication correction exercise.” That diagnosis matters because creators are hired for trust. A 2025 India influencer-marketing report estimated the market at ₹3,600 crore in 2024 and forecast 25% growth in 2025; 70% of surveyed brands cited trust and credibility as leading reasons to use influencers.

Yet ASCI’s 2025 dipstick study found 76% of the top 100 digital stars failed disclosure norms, up from 69% a year earlier. Its rules require a clear label whenever money, gifts, free products, discounts, travel or another material connection exists. The advertiser must ensure code compliance; the creator must make the disclosure.

The practical response is straightforward: verify claims before publication, ban restricted-category promotions, specify approved disclosure labels in contracts, preserve substantiation evidence and audit posts after release. Brands should assess expertise, audience fit and compliance history alongside reach and engagement. Creator marketing will remain valuable, but only when credibility is managed as an operating control, not borrowed as a personality trait.