Critical Evaluation of Marketing Ethics in Social Media Networking

Manipulating the consumer consciousness using unethical marketing techniques affect his or her purchasing behavior and choices. However, there arise ethical issues concerning doing the right thing and making profits. According to research survey done by Ethics Resource Center, 43% respondents do not practice with ethical integrity. The marketing practice experiences indicate high contention in legal and ethical issues (Information Resources Management Association, 2013, p. An example of such problems includes data collection and the invasion of privacy issue that infringes the consumer bill of rights to be safe informed, heard and the right to choose freely. The companies reckon how essential it is to engage in more ethical businesses practice in marketing or broadcasting their transformation to their consumers. The primary way to achieve ethical goals is by improving ethics in marketing.

Focusing on Ethics marketing incentives like ethical advertising enables the company to appeal positively in the area of business (Wadhwa & Harper, 2015, p. When consumers experience sites like Facebook, Google, Twitter, My Space among others that allow open social communication they are at the risks of deception scams and even the reason for the attention of networking ethics. The Ethical Issues Experienced in Social Media Networking This section illustrates examples of ethical challenges experienced by the companies. Trivedi et al. (2017, p. 935) suggest that first is the invasion of privacy. When social media companies engage in operations that break the law, and the term of confidentiality of any user of social network harms a person or credibility, which is unethical. Invasion includes non-permissive approaches taken to acquire information about a person with the intention of hurting him.

For example, Chi, Hsu-Hsien (2011, p. 61) mentions that finding consumer information through a shared directory is not consent hence a company would not be sued for consent if they extracted the data through a website shared with the consumer. Additionally, social media networking entails advertising with questionable claims involving the quality of the product, availability of service or any excluded information about the product. For instance, problems may arise if they are severe claims about the misleading advertisement (Wadhwa & Harper, 2015, p. Deceptive marketing policies are also not regulated within specific limits to particular markets thus remained under-addressed by the public (Barnett, 2011, p. Selective marketing ignores the demand by the non-selected groups according to age, ethnicity, gender, and sexualism (Powell & Shaun, 2011, p. 88) Notably, ethical marketing is not a marketing strategy but a theory that validates other marketing efforts.

Ethics is also not a rule but a general guideline for assisting companies to evaluate their marketing strategies. The process promotes honesty, fairness, and responsibility in advertisement and promotion (Weiss, 2014, p. Hence, ethical marketing emphasizes common standard of the truth. 172) suggest that for companies to improve the image and develop popularity among consumers unlike being unethical that leads to failure. No consumer wants to feel exploited at the end of a transaction. Ethical marketing enables the companies to develop trust among consumers that way increases loyalty more returnees. By living up to the promises as stated in the ethical advertisement promotes a positive image about the company assuring the consumer that the company invests in producing quality products with value to them.

Notably, ethics has no real definition; it changes over time and has no specific boundary. The primary goal of ethical marketing is the realization of community needs within critical moral terms. (Palmer, p. Relating moral principles in business requires involving stakeholders who include customers, employees, local communities, and suppliers. Observing the ethics means that the company follows the rules and regulation including standard requirements governing the conduct of organization of members. Unethical advertising is not a guarantee to increased profits. A company has to decide what in the marketing and advertising to perform ethically. Marketing professionals must reach an agreement about what to focus on marketing factual claims, avoiding stereotyping or criticizing competitiveness. There is no definitive strategy for establishing truthfulness in advertising and the ability to influence customers.

Ethical marketers decide on customers and leveraging capital when they engage ethical decisions. Notably, making the right decision is not enough motivations. 1) suggests that identifying the unethical issues depicts the capability of ethical decision making. Secondly, one identifies important factors that define ethics in the environment including stakeholders and professional code and law that assist in perceiving the moral implication of practice to the policy, business, and surrounding environment. Evaluating the effect of the activities in preparation helps the company to compare and develop alternative methods for specific stakeholders according to the scope and reasonability of the decisions made (Turban et al. , 2016, p. The final step entails the evaluation of the implications of the decisions made to monitor and to learning outcomes and to change the actions according to specific challenges experienced in the future.

There exist unmatched risks with the continued use of the online social media especially with concerning to the collection of personal data and using it for another purpose other than the intended. Al-Deen & Hendricks (2012, p. 255), report that posting private information leads to ethical issues as eminent in privacy, discrimination, inaccurate communication, subjectivity and sharing of inappropriate effects that might lead to other lapses relating to security. The response to those issues focuses on solving questions answering honesty, discriminating the audience, authenticity, fairness, and privacy (Zgheib, 2015, p. This section illustrates various responses techniques in an attempt to address the ethical issues. For instance, Google faced a $2. 91 billion fine by the European Commission on account of bleaching antitrust scrutiny as a result of overusing it power over dominance in internet search engines.

On the other hand, a Belgian Court ruled that Facebook stop collecting data illegally because they do not specify the type of data they collect, the duration it stores the data or how it uses the data (Trivedi et al. , 2017, p. Reynolds (2018, p. Nonetheless, existing ethics guidelines depend on internet market environmental on the internet that entails massive data collection (Barnett, 2011, p. Acting upon ethical guidelines discriminates various market responses that might lead to more restricted regulation or a more controlled environment. The relationship between commerce and legislation hinders the implementation of ethical marketing and take longer to become successive (Turban et al. Ethical issues in social media networking include the invasion of rights to privacy, discrimination, and audience grouping, and misleading communication which lead to severe consequences.