“零添加”不能乱写了！拼多多出手整治食品营销话术

This article centers on Pinduoduo's launch of a special campaign to crack down on misleading food marketing that uses "zero-additive" and "additive-free" claims. Here are key takeaways for general readers:

1. The campaign has clear violation standards: All "zero-additive", "additive-free" claims, as well as their synonyms including "zero", "0%" and "does not contain", are subject to regulation. Any claim that an ingredient is "absent" or "not contained" requires the actual content of that ingredient to be exactly zero. In addition, brands are prohibited from using "absent" or "not contained" claims for substances that are already banned by regulations from being added to food.

2. The crackdown covers all consumer touchpoints for product information, including product titles, images, detail pages, live streams and short videos, covering nearly every path through which consumers encounter product information.

3. Consumers can report any non-compliant claims via Pinduoduo's official channels, and the platform will investigate and handle the reports, helping consumers protect their own legitimate rights and interests.

Against the backdrop of Pinduoduo's special crackdown on non-compliant food marketing, here are key takeaways for food brands relevant to their operations:

1. All marketing activities must strictly comply with regulatory requirements. No marketing channel is allowed to improperly label products as "zero-additive", and even synonyms such as "0%" or "no use" fall under the scope of regulation. If you claim a product does not contain a certain ingredient, you must ensure the actual content of that ingredient is zero. Regardless of whether you emphasize the presence or absence of additives, you must clearly label the specific content of the ingredient. Non-compliance will result in penalties.

2. This campaign reflects both growing consumer demand for ingredient transparency in the food industry and a broader trend of stricter regulation. Brands can no longer cut corners by exploiting vague "zero-additive" claims. They need to implement ingredient control from the product development stage, shift to authentic, compliant ingredient disclosure, and adapt to market and regulatory requirements.

3. Violations will directly disrupt brands' channel operations: Penalties include product delisting, ranking demotion, and restrictions on fund withdrawals, among other measures. Brands should immediately conduct self-inspections and rectifications of marketing content for all their products currently on sale to avoid damage to brand reputation and disruptions to normal operations.

Pinduoduo has released this special regulation on food product marketing claims. Here are key takeaways for food sellers, including policy interpretation and risk response guidance:

1. The policy draws clear boundaries for violations: All claims related to "zero-additive" and "additive-free", including all their synonyms, are covered by regulation, and this applies to all business scenarios from product titles and detail pages to live streams. Any "absent" or "not contained" claim requires the actual content of the referenced ingredient to be zero. It is also prohibited to use "additive-free"-style claims for substances already banned by regulation from being added to food, and any content emphasizing whether an additive is included must list the specific content of the ingredient.

2. The policy clarifies the consequences and risks of violations. The platform will impose penalties ranging from product delisting, ranking demotion, restrictions on new product listings, restrictions on fund withdrawals, to store closure, depending on the severity of the violation. Sellers should take these compliance risks seriously.

3. Clear response steps are outlined: Sellers should immediately conduct self-inspections and rectifications of marketing content for all food products in their stores. This crackdown also signals that compliance is a major trend for food e-commerce, and only authentic, compliant marketing can support long-term growth.

Here are key takeaways for food manufacturers from Pinduoduo's crackdown on non-compliant food marketing:

1. Requirements for production and product labeling are now clearer. The campaign against "zero-additive" claims requires manufacturers to accurately control the content of all ingredients. If a product is to make an "additive-free" claim, the corresponding ingredient content must truly be zero, and all ingredient content data must be accurate and traceable to meet the marketing requirements of downstream sellers and platforms.

2. The campaign also opens up new business opportunities. Consumers are already concerned about food ingredient safety. On the basis of accurate ingredient labeling, manufacturers can develop compliant healthy food products with transparent ingredients that align with consumer demand. This allows manufacturers to avoid the risk of misleading marketing and achieve compliant growth.

3. The crackdown offers key insights for manufacturers selling through e-commerce channels. As e-commerce platforms increasingly enforce stricter marketing compliance requirements, manufacturers must provide accurate ingredient content data when supplying to downstream sellers, and collaborate on compliant marketing to avoid having products delisted due to non-compliant claims that would hurt sales.

Here are key takeaways for food e-commerce service providers from this special crackdown:

1. The campaign clarifies the industry's development direction: Marketing compliance for food e-commerce has become an inevitable trend, and platforms are continuously ramping up efforts to crack down on false advertising. This will lead to significant growth in market demand for compliance-related services, and service providers can prepare by expanding their compliance-focused business lines in advance.

2. The crackdown highlights the core pain points of current clients. A large number of brands and small-to-medium sellers do not understand the violation boundaries defined by this campaign, and do not know how to adjust their marketing content, making them highly vulnerable to penalties. This has created strong demand for compliance rectification services.

3. Service providers can develop targeted solutions: For example, they can offer full-store, full-scenario compliance audits of marketing content, compile a standardized list of non-compliant terms outlined by the campaign, help merchants revise marketing materials including product titles, detail pages, and live stream scripts, and help merchants build routine compliance review processes for marketing content. These services help clients meet platform requirements and avoid penalties for violations.

Here are key takeaways for other e-commerce platform operators from Pinduoduo's special crackdown:

1. The overuse of "zero-additive" marketing claims is a widespread problem in the food category, and consumers have filed many complaints about such false advertising. Proactive regulation by platforms not only protects consumer rights, but also improves user trust in the platform, which aligns with the platform's long-term development interests.

2. Pinduoduo's mature approach is highly replicable. The platform first defines prohibited misleading terms, brings all synonymous expressions under unified management, covers all scenarios including product titles, detail pages, live streams and short videos, establishes clear violation standards and tiered penalties, requires merchants to conduct self-inspection and rectification, and opens a consumer reporting channel. This complete operational framework is highly referenceable.

3. Proactive regulation helps platforms mitigate compliance risks in advance. Food marketing compliance is a shared requirement for both regulators and consumers. Regulating these practices early helps platforms avoid future regulatory risks. Platforms can also clarify compliance requirements during the merchant onboarding stage to pre-screen compliant merchants and reduce the platform's overall compliance exposure.

Here are key takeaways for researchers studying the e-commerce and food industries from this event:

1. This is a new industrial development in the food e-commerce sector: E-commerce platforms have begun proactively addressing long-standing regulatory gaps for misleading vague marketing, which reflects the industry's shift from traditional traffic competition to a new phase of competition built on trust and compliance.

2. The event also exposes new problems facing the industry: The overuse of "zero-additive" marketing claims is widespread across food marketing. Many merchants exploit consumer demand for healthy food to make misleading edge claims, and false advertising seriously violates consumer rights. Resolving this issue requires deeper collaboration between platform self-regulation and official regulatory bodies.

3. Pinduoduo's governance model -- which features full-scenario coverage, unified management of synonymous misleading terms, and tiered penalties -- is a new practice of platform participation in food industry governance. It provides a real-world case for studying e-commerce platform governance rules and the development path of industrial compliance, and offers a new research sample for exploring industry-wide compliance governance models.