Issues in Marketing Ethics | Commercial Applications - Class 6 PDF Download

​There are some disagreements and conflicts that give rise to ethical issues in many companies concerning marketing.  There is a fixed set of expectations regarding the business and its transactions and how they have to be carried out. The following domains have ethical issues concerning their functioning:​

1. Market Research: It revolves around the collection and analysis of information about consumers as well as competitors and the effectiveness of marketing campaigns. Ethical issues that might arise during the process are an invasion of privacy and stereotyping.
2. Market Audience: Excluding potential market sectors like LGBTs, ethnic minorities, etc. are some of the ethical marketing issues associated with the market audience. Also targeting vulnerable audiences with a marketing campaign is also an ethical marketing issue.
3. Advertising and Promotion: Shaming rivals’ products or services are considered unethical in advertising and promotion. Other ethical issues in advertising and marketing campaigns may be mistreatment of women or any human being, misleading advertising, issues related to trust, honesty, violence, profanity, sex, taste, controversy that may lead to the ethical declining of society.
4. Pricing Ethics: Different unethical pricing strategies that are considered issues in ethical marketing campaigns are-
   • Bid rigging
   • Dumping (pricing policy)
   • Predatory pricing
   • Price gouging
   • Price fixing
   • Supra competitive pricing
   • Price discrimination
   • Price skimming
   • Price war
   • Variable pricing

Conclusion

• On the concluding note, we can define marketing ethics as an area of applied ethics that is associated with moral principles behind the operation and regulation of marketing that ethical companies use to differentiate between right and wrong marketing decisions and their implementations.
• Many companies that use unethical marketing strategies do not care what is right and wrong on ethical grounds, and ultimately lose the trust of their audiences. Therefore, opting for unethical practices is never suggested by the market leaders.