From March 1, under new advertising standards, social media "influencers" have to clearly label their sponsored content.

It means that, for the first time in Australia, you will have a pretty good idea whether the post in your Instagram feed has been paid for by a brand. The new code by the Australian Association of National Advertisers (AANA) covers all social media platforms, and any kind of social media user.

Breaking the AANA code won't mean a huge penalty - the association is self-regulating and following the rules is voluntary. The rules only apply to the brands themselves. The Advertising Standards Board can ask for the ad to be taken down.

The real danger is prosecution by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) for breach of Australian Consumer Law (ACL). That hasn't happened yet in Australia - there have been no legal cases against social media influencers. But it could. Brands are increasingly turning to influencers to promote their products, and this has led to young people becoming their own ad agencies.

Few of these social influencers are across ACL. Breaching the ACL carries a maximum fine of $220,000 per post for an influencer, and $1.1m for a brand.

The AANA rules are a guide to staying out of trouble. Here's what you need to know.

What is sponsored content?

It's usually pretty clear what is sponsored content - a brand pays an influencer to wear their dress or spruik a hotel. The grey area is around scenarios where the brand just gives the influencer the dress and they then endorse it on social media.

The guidelines set out two criteria:

Does the marketer have a reasonable degree of control over the material; and

Does the material draw the attention of the public in a manner calculated to promote a product or service.

The key word here is "control". If a brand doesn't tell you what you have to say, there's probably no control. Lawyer Stephen Von Muenster, a leading authority on consumer law, told Hack there may be some "implied control" when the brand advises about "key messages" or gives the influencer more product than they should - for example, a year's supply of makeup rather than a sample.

"There's shades of grey and no easy answer," he said.

Sarah Harrison, who has the 12,500 followers on her @littlemissmelbourne Instagram account, and sometimes does paid content, said her rule of thumb was "whether the content you've created ... has the potential to mislead."

"We need to be mindful and avoid creating a misleading and false impression, and we really have that duty of care for ourselves and our audience."

"It's about being real, and being true, and being authentic."

What's the pay scale?

It depends on the brand, but according to Tribe Group, which connects influencers with brands, influencers should ask for between $75 and $1200 per post. Here's Tribe's guide for influencers:

Followers per account Ballpark rate per post 3-20K $75-$300 20-100K $300-$600 100-250K $550-$800 200-500K $800-$1200 500K+ $1200+

In the past, brands would contact an influencer directly. But the industry has recently matured. A brand can now tender for paid content through a broker like Tribe, and influencers will then submit their pitches. The brand only pays for the content they choose. If the influencer gets the tick, they post the content. Tribe collects a 20 per cent commission.

Tribe Group head Jules Lund said one major international brand recently received 85 pitches in 48 hours after putting a tender on the app.

"One girl has already made $85,000 and she's a dietician with 180,000 followers," he said.

"We paid $1.5 million last year to everyday content creators."

Tribe has 300 brands on its app, and 9,000 influencers. One of these is Sarah Harrison. She said she liked the app, although it put the brand "in the driver's seat".

"They're the decision makers about whether you go with them or not," she said.

"It's becoming more and more like advertising."

How do I label the content?

The exact label doesn't matter, so long as the message is clear. The AANA recommends adding "#ad" to the post. Jules Lund, fro theTribe Group, told Hack he was recommending #spon.

Jules said Tribe had found no difference between the popularity of posts that disclose their commercial nature and those that don't.

But everyone already knows about paid posts ...

That may be true, but it doesn't matter to the ACL. Even if your target audience are savvy Gen Y, the potential audience could be Baby Boomers who have no idea.

Is anyone complaining about being duped on Insta? Probably not. Jules Lund said 15 months ago the ACCC told him it had received no consumer complaints. "They said we don't intervene unless we have a consumer complaint and we haven't yet."

Hack wasn't able to confirm this with the ACCC, although a spokesman said the Commission had not pursued any social media influencers for breach of the ACL.

So, it's fair to assume there haven't been a lot of complaints. This is probably because people on Insta and other platforms already know about paid content.

Read about ACL in more detail.

What if I promote a product that doesn't work?

Using #ad won't save you here.

It's well established that testimonials have to be accurate and true. If you knowingly promote a product that doesn't work, you can get fined.

The big case here is from 2015 and known as the Turpie Case. Celebrity Ian Turpie, former host of the game show The Price Is Right, gave testimonial in an advertisement about an erectile dysfunction nasal spray. He claimed it had restored his sexual potency.

"It was all completely untrue," Stephen Von Muenster said. "He was sued and so was the brand and the ad agency."

Why is this happening now?

The two big recent events in this space have been when Australia Post was caught out paying Instagrammers for endorsements, and last year when Instagram star Essena O'Neill lifted the lid on being paid thousands for posts to her 600,000 followers.

Also, in the US and UK, you are required by law to disclose a sponsored post.

Jules Lund said that in the past 12 months there has been a steady influx of "micro-influencers" who have few followers but are looking to make money. Sarah Harrison also said she had noticed the influencer space becoming a lot more competitive in the last six months.

The new AANA rules are partly a reflection of the advertising money that's flowing into platforms like Instagram, Twitter and Facebook.

Jules Lund said that "influencer marketing" was no longer about pushing products through major celebrities with more than 500,000 followers.

"That's the Kardashian way of doing things," he said. "These people didn't earn their tribe one by one over a course of thousands of posts.

"These people earn it because they're in a magazine."

He said that in the first wave of influencer marketing, the big celebrities had a monopoly and brands would throw cash at them. But as the prices charged went up, brands started to question the effectiveness. "Then all of a sudden technology caught up."

He said influencer marketing was now in the second wave, where the focus was on the quality of the content. Brands were now willing to pay "micro-influencers" for clever posts.

"It's reverted back to social media not socialite media," he said.

"Influencers now have access to 300 brands in our app. If they posted one a week it would take them six years as of today."

"Why would you promote shoes you don't believe in when you can promote the shoes on your feet?"