SEC Marketing Rule Testimonials: What Advisors Can Post

Yes, SEC-registered investment advisers can publish client testimonials. They have been able to since November 4, 2022, the compliance date of the SEC Marketing Rule at 17 CFR 275.206(4)-1, which swept away the old flat prohibition. What the rule asks in return is narrow and specific: three disclosures presented clearly and prominently next to every testimonial, a reasonable basis for believing it complies, a written agreement with anyone you pay above a de minimis amount, and no paying disqualified people at all.

Most of the confusion in this area is not about whether testimonials are allowed. It is about two details firms consistently get wrong: which statements count as testimonials rather than endorsements, and where the disclosure has to physically sit on the page. The SEC answered the second one in December 2025 in a way that rules out how a lot of review widgets are built.

What actually changed in 2022

The predecessor rule, old Rule 206(4)-1(a)(1), treated any testimonial in an adviser advertisement as a fraudulent, deceptive or manipulative practice. Not risky, not conditioned: prohibited. That is why advisory firm websites spent two decades showing stock photographs of couples on sailboats where every other industry showed customer quotes.

The SEC adopted the replacement Marketing Rule in December 2020. It became effective May 4, 2021, with an eighteen month transition, and the compliance date landed on November 4, 2022. The rule merged the old advertising rule and the old cash solicitation rule into one framework, and it opened the door to testimonials, endorsements and third-party ratings for the first time.

The conditions live in paragraph (b):

• (b)(1) disclosure. Three items clear and prominent, plus compensation terms and the promoter's own conflicts.
• (b)(2) oversight. A reasonable basis for believing the testimonial complies, and a written agreement with anyone giving a compensated testimonial or endorsement, describing scope and compensation terms.
• (b)(3) disqualification. You may not compensate an ineligible person, meaning someone subject to a disqualifying event, with a ten year lookback.
• (b)(4) exemptions, including de minimis compensation and affiliated personnel.

Testimonial or endorsement? The distinction that trips up most firms

This is definitional, not a judgment call, and getting it wrong makes your disclosure inaccurate rather than merely imperfect.

Paragraph (e)(17) defines a testimonial as a statement by a current client or investor about their experience with the adviser. Paragraph (e)(5) defines an endorsement as a statement by any person who is not a current client or investor. Read those together and a consequence falls out that surprises people: a former client who says something generous about you after moving their account has given you an endorsement. So has the CPA who refers you business, so has your operations manager, so has a friend of the firm who has never been a client.

Because paragraph (b)(1)(i)(A) requires you to disclose whether the person is a current client, the sentence under the quote has to be accurate for that specific person. There is no single boilerplate string.

For the most common case, an unpaid current client, a workable line reads: this testimonial was given by a current client, no compensation was provided for it, and there are no material conflicts of interest. Have your CCO settle the house wording, then change it when the facts change rather than leaving one line under everything.

Why hyperlinked disclosures no longer work

On December 16, 2025 the SEC Division of Examinations published compliance observations from its Marketing Rule exams. One finding matters more than the rest if you are choosing software: advisers who placed the required disclosures behind a hyperlink did not meet the clear and prominent standard. The staff reached the same conclusion about third-party rating disclosures, describing reliance on hyperlinks alone as insufficient.

That converts a compliance question into a layout question. A wall of five-star quotes in a carousel with a small Disclosures link in the footer is precisely the arrangement described. The disclosure has to render in the same visual block as the testimonial, and it has to be there when the testimonial is first published rather than added at the next review.

Can financial advisors ask clients for Google reviews?

Yes, and this is where firms create exposure without meaning to. A Google Business Profile carrying client reviews is not automatically your advertisement. It becomes one through two doctrines the SEC carried over from its social media guidance. Adoption is endorsing or approving content after it was published. Entanglement is having been involved in preparing it.

Letting every client post candid feedback, and then leaving it alone, generally keeps you clear of both. You wander into entanglement by asking only the clients you expect to be complimentary, or by steering what they write. You wander into adoption by selectively deleting, hiding or reordering comments so the display flatters you.

The practical test is whether your process is even-handed and whether you can show that it was. Put the same request in a monthly client newsletter or in every post-review-meeting follow up. Word it to invite candid feedback rather than praise. Keep the list of who was asked. Ask everyone and you have a process; ask the happy ones and you have an advertisement you did not disclose.

Can an adviser delete a negative review?

Deleting or suppressing negative comments is the clearest example of the presentation manipulation that pulls third-party content into your own marketing. It is also what most people reach for first. The lower-risk response to an unhappy client is a phone call, not a takedown, and not a public reply either: answering some reviews and not others starts to look like approving the ones you left alone.

There is a corollary worth stating plainly, because it cuts the other way and firms rarely think it through. A curated wall of testimonials on your own website is your advertisement. You chose which ones appear and in what order. That is entirely permissible, and it is what most advisory sites should be doing. It simply means the (b)(1) disclosures attach to it. The mistake is imagining that because clients wrote the words, the curated display is neutral third-party content.

When you need a written agreement, and when you do not

Paragraph (b)(2)(ii) requires a written agreement with any person giving a testimonial or endorsement, describing the scope of the agreed activities and the terms of compensation. Paragraph (b)(4)(i) then lifts that requirement, along with the disqualification provision, where compensation is de minimis: $1,000 or less, or the equivalent value in non-cash compensation, over the preceding twelve months.

So an unpaid current client writing two sentences about your service needs no agreement. A gift card at the low end sits inside the de minimis carve-out. A referral arrangement paying a percentage of fees is a different animal: agreement first, disclosure of the terms, and disqualification diligence before any money moves. Firms running more than a handful of these find it easier to keep a standard promoter agreement they can send out for signature and store than to draft one each time, since the exam finding is usually that the agreement was missing rather than that it was badly written.

What this means for your website

Three things, in order of how often they are wrong.

First, the disclosure goes in the card, next to the quote, at a size people read. Second, the wording has to match who actually said it, which means your system needs to record whether each person was a current client at the time and whether anything of value changed hands. Third, keep the record of the whole process, because paragraph (b)(2)(i) asks for a reasonable basis and a folder of screenshots is not one.

On content, steer clients toward service rather than performance. A client describing that you talked them out of selling in a bad month, explained the fee schedule without being asked twice, and returned calls the same day is persuasive and safe. A client mentioning a return figure drags you into the performance advertising conditions of the same rule, which carry their own net-of-fee and prescribed time period requirements that no testimonial page should be trying to satisfy.

If you want the mechanics of collecting and displaying these, our page on financial advisor testimonials covers the collection side, and the Google reviews widget page covers pulling the reviews you already earned onto pages you control. Advisers are not the only regulated buyers with this problem: the equivalent analysis for attorneys is on law firm testimonials, and every US business also sits under the FTC rules on consumer reviews and testimonials. For documenting permission itself, see our guide to the testimonial release form.

This article is general information about a securities regulation, not legal or compliance advice. Rule 206(4)-1 applies to SEC-registered advisers; if you are state-registered your administrator sets the advertising rules, and if you are also a registered representative, FINRA Rule 2210 applies on top and your firm's position will usually be stricter. Run your testimonial program past your CCO before you publish.