Few tasks create more headaches for compliance officers than reviewing and approving marketing materials. As capital raising has grown more challenging, compliance officers have become inundated with requests from in-house marketers to review new or modified presentations designed to retain existing investors and secure new allocations. Due to the deliberate nature of a compliance officer’s review of marketing materials, compliance is often characterized as a perennial bottleneck, yet the review of advertisements by knowledgeable compliance professionals is critical to minimizing regulatory and litigation risk to the adviser. This two-part series is dedicated to assisting managers with developing and enhancing their advertising compliance policies and practices. This first article outlines what documents fall within the advertisement definition and outlines ten best practices that managers should consider implementing when designing or evaluating their advertising review procedures. The second article will explore six different testing mechanisms firms can employ to verify compliance with their advertising procedures. See our three-part series on operational deficiencies in non-standard performance calculations: “Common Process Issues” (Feb. 9, 2021): “Common Recordkeeping and Disclosure Issues” (Feb. 16, 2021); and “Nuts and Bolts of Upgrading Controls” (Feb. 23, 2021).