The Ethical Landscape Advertising

The Ethical Landscape Advertising

In advertising, the truth is the most valuable currency. In marketing and advertising, consumers place a higher value on the accuracy of the information given by an advert rather than the quality of the advert. As such, advertisers and advertising agencies should strive to ensure that the information they are passing to their audience is factual to enhance customer loyalty. When a customer feels that the information they are fed with by the advertisers is accurate and factual, customer trust is built and maintained. Otherwise, wrong information dents the image of the product and that of the advertiser. The conveyance of the truth, however, should be in a responsible manner. In a way that will not scare away existing clients and potential clients.

Another ethical landscape in advertising is the target population. The target population is a very critical aspect of advertising. When a person is advertising a product for an adult audience, one must be cautious that the advert does not infringe on the rights and the innocence of children. Consequently, while advertising for children or vulnerable members of society, a person must ensure that the advertisement does not advocate for their mistreat. The advert should not be manipulative in any way, hence providing and assuring the integrity of the ad is maintained. Products such as alcohol and cigarettes should not have kids in them to ensure that a wrong message is not sent to kids. When dealing with wide-scale marketing, where research is necessary. As such, advertisers should be keen to ensure that the participants’ information privacy is maintained (FTC, 2020).

For advertisers, truthful information is not enough. We need to give accurate and detailed information. The detailed information, in this case, should entail possible gifts that the advert carries. It should also state the conditions necessary to win it. In the case of social media, word-of-mouth advertisers, and bloggers, it is paramount for this group of people to give further clarification on whether the advert they are airing is their personal opinion. It may turn out they are being paid to push a particular brand, but they, on the other hand, are advertising it as if it is their personal opinion. This type of advertising may lead to misinformation, which is dangerous and may hurt the brand. However, there is a dilemma in this kind of advertising. Most organizations go for this kind of advertisers due to the personalization of the message and the product. Thereby, curtailing this form of advertisement is counter-productive

The legal landscape

In the United States, advertisements and advertisers are regulated. The regulating authority is the Federal Trade Commission. The objective of the commission is primarily to protect the consumers and also protect the competition from unfair competitive strategies. In this advertising sector, there exist a few legal hazards. One of those hazards is an invasion of user privacy. The invasion of user privacy is prone to the online advertising sphere. An advertiser can quickly obtain user information, but it is their responsibility to ensure the confidentiality of the user is maintained. For an advertiser to use a person’s data, there is a need to have express authority from the user (FTC, 2020).

The other hazard is copyright infringement. In this day and age of social media, there is a large pool of images on the Internet and social media applications. These large pools contain images that will suit an individual advertiser’s angle of an advert. However, these images are not open source pictures with a “commons license only.” Some photos require a license to use. If an advertiser does not carry out their due diligence, they might find themselves sued for copyright infringement. Copyright infringement does not occur on images only. The violations may occur in videos and music. As such, to be on the safe side, an advertiser may have to acquire a license for each item before incorporating it into their brand.

Finally, another hazard is the advertising standards used. For starters, one must use the laid out advertising language. Insulting, vulgar, and rude language contravenes these rules. No matter the item a person is advertising, it is acceptable to use any offense word. In adverts that will be heard by children, there are set language standards to ensure that morality of the advert and that of the children is at par. An advertiser should be cautious about any form of defamatory language. The abusive language is concerning fellow advertisers and other brands. In the structuring of an advert, a person may not give misleading information. On matters of advertising standards, a person may not pick up a competitor advertising and produce an almost replica advert. One advert should be as different as possible from the competitor (Smart Company, 2016).

My personal view.

I find there is no conflict between the law and the ethics of advertising. The law in the advertising sector protects the advertiser from fellow advertisers who want to take advantage of their work. The law does this by agitating for stricter adherence to the ethics of advertising. This law advocates for the release of truthful information. This advocacy helps the ethical responsibility of all adverts and advertisers to deliver accurate and factual information to its audience. The law protects advertisers from copyright infringements. The law on copyright infringement shines a light on the ethical aspect of being accurate. Picking up an image, video, or music from the Internet and presenting it as a representation of the advert without the owner’s consent is not accurate or factual.

The role of this profession is to provide factual information to the population and convince them that their product is the best. The responsibility to tailor a sustained message to a target audience fulfills this responsibility. The burden of being factual, in my opinion, fulfills their role of providing accurate information. The resource for copyright infringement is the most helpful resource I have found. Knowing that the data on the Internet is not free mean I have to reconsider everything I work on. I agree with the lawfully. I advocate for proper regulation to be met in the social media form of advertising.