Scottish Power's advert featuring George Clarke banned for misleading viewers

A TV advertisement for Scottish Power featuring architect George Clarke has been banned by the UK's Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) for misleading viewers into thinking they were watching a segment of his show, Amazing Spaces. The ad aired during breaks of the programme and included the text 'George Clarke’s amazing green spaces' along with visual elements that closely resembled the show. Although the ad included a '#ad' label for the first 12 seconds and mentioned Scottish Power products, the ASA found these identifiers insufficient to distinguish it from editorial content. Complaints indicated that viewers were likely to initially interpret the advertisement as part of the programme. The ASA emphasized that the ad needed to be clearly distinguishable from the editorial content it mimicked to avoid confusion. Scottish Power contended that the ad was recognizable as promotional but ultimately did not satisfy the ASA's standards.