Audit your banners and popups

A stale placement contradicts every page it covers

A product page can be edited while the banner above it keeps its old wording. The announcement bar from last quarter's sale, the popup offering a discount whose terms page was removed, the shipping promise made before the fulfillment model changed: each is a claim the store is still making on every page that placement targets.

The reach is set by the placement's actual configuration, not by assumption. Some placements run sitewide; others target specific pages, categories, or visitor states. Check the targeting first so the audit covers the pages each placement really appears on — a conflict on a targeted banner affects exactly those pages, no more and no fewer.

Capture the states, not just the default

A banner or popup rarely has one face. Schedules swap variants. Some show only to first-time visitors, only after a cart rule, only on exit intent, or only on certain pages. An inventory of the default state misses the claim a different visitor actually sees.

Inspect the actual published states and the authorized campaign configuration in your banner or popup tool: what triggers each variant, which pages it targets, and the exact wording live in each state. Where a state cannot be displayed on demand, record the wording from the configuration and say that is where it came from. Keep configuration records distinct from directly observed states; a configured variant is not proof that you saw it displayed.

Test each statement against its destination and records

Most promotional statements point somewhere, explicitly or by implication. A discount points to its terms. A countdown points to an end date. A shipping promise points to the shipping policy. Where a statement has a destination, open it and compare. Where it has none, check the business's records before judging it; some claims are supported by records rather than public pages.

The FTC's truth-in-advertising guidance requires truthful, substantiated claims across media including the web. Stripe's website article lists promotion terms among the items a site can be asked to show — that is Stripe's rule for Stripe accounts, and a reminder that a reviewer can look for the terms behind a promotion. A banner promising something factually different from its terms, or terms that no longer exist, is a conflict with both the statement and the destination on record. A claim nothing supports is the one to fix or retire.

The claims that fail on a research-only storefront

Banners compress, and compression invites the strongest version of a claim. On a research-only storefront, watch for outcome language in promotions — words that imply a result for the buyer — and for audience drift, where a banner addresses consumers while the catalog addresses researchers. A compressed claim is still the store's claim.

Also watch for urgency that is not real: a countdown that resets, a deadline that repeats weekly, a stock warning that does not match the catalog. If the urgency has no record behind it, the honest options are a truthful deadline or no countdown.

Retire, narrow, or verify, and date the change

The actions are simple: retire the placement whose claim is no longer true, narrow the wording to what the destination or records support, or publish the missing terms so the claim has an address. Record who owns each placement, what changed, and the date the new state was live in every targeted variant, not just the default.

Promotions rotate by design, so this surface goes stale quickly — set the next audit date while you are in here. What an audit never settles is legality or eligibility: a truthful banner is not a legal finding and not an approval. Legal questions belong to qualified counsel; account decisions belong to the provider. Prism's published review covers marketing claims, including banners, within an agreed scope, with findings that are informational.

Placement, trigger, claim, and destination inventory

One row per banner or popup placement, with a line for each published state. Copy exact wording from the live state or the authorized configuration, and check the destination or record behind each claim.

Worksheet entries are not submitted by Prism’s worksheet and are not saved by the site. Use record types, availability, anonymized observations, or match/mismatch results. Do not enter government identifiers, customer names or addresses, customer messages, receipt-access links, card or bank details, passwords, or keys. Send sensitive documents only through the provider’s verified secure channel.

These are temporary notes. Leaving or reloading this page may clear them. Worksheet entries are not sent automatically. If you copy notes into the consultation message and submit the form, Prism receives them as part of your request.