ASA rules that Wayne Rooney Nike tweet didn’t breach marketing rules
The ASA has ruled in favour of footballer Wayne Rooney in respect of a marketing tweet issued from his official Twitter account over concern from a complainant that it was not obviously discernible as a marketing communication.
This concerned a message penned by the star saying: “The pitches change. The killer instinct doesn't. Own the turf, anywhere. @NikeFootball #myground pic.twitter.com/22jrPwdgC1”
Responding to the complaint Nike stated that they believed consumers would understand that a Rooney tweet referencing @NikeFootball would only be used for marketing purposes, something that the ASA In their ruling the ASA concurred with in their own ruling which read: “We considered the reference to Nike Football was prominent and clearly linked the tweet with the Nike brand.
“Whilst we considered that not all Twitter users would be aware of Wayne Rooney's sponsorship deal with Nike or the particular Nike campaign the tweet promoted, we considered that in the particular context of a tweet by Wayne Rooney the wording of the initial statement was such that in combination with "@NikeFootball" and "#myground", the overall effect was that the tweet was obviously identifiable as a Nike marketing
communication.”
No further action in the case was deemed to be necessary.