Digital Marketing is the latest buzzword. Anyone and everyone has gone digital and wants to sell some service or product. During such time it becomes all the more pertinent to understand some do's and don'ts of digital marketing.
So what is the basic function of marketing? As defined by AMA it is, Marketing is the activity, set of institutions, and processes for creating, communicating, delivering, and exchanging offerings that have value for customers, clients, partners, and society at large.
Buying and selling requires a lot of trust. It also requires value add made to customer. Once established this can do wonders for the brand in the long term. There have been a lot of unethical practices used by the marketing industry to attract the customer and buy things.
This has gone to a whole new level by digital marketing.
Let’s see a few unethical practices which we need to be cautious about.
New Entrants with Less Subject Matter Knowledge:
Since digital marketing is a hot skill a lot of newbies with less knowledge and experience have entered the market and are experimenting this can sometimes put the ethics at risk.
Misuse of Buzzwords: The latest buzzwords like sustainable, healthy, organic are used to promote food products across age groups including infants.
Plagiarism: of brand names by misspelling, logos tilted slightly to create confusion, marketing messages/slogans.
Incorrect Program Information: concealing information of the product which is important for people to know, not informing side effects sufficiently, exaggerating of information to get more customers.
Misuse of Pictures: A picture speaks a thousand words. Many health food products display healthy pictures but their calories breakdown chart is opposite. An attractive display can attract attention but may not necessarily be a decision making point. Posting videos with controversial and irrelevant thumbnails just to attract an audience
Misuse of User Data: Manipulating the facts and posting on various social media platforms in the interest of product promotion. While gathering data people are not made aware of the purpose and use of data.
Defining Target Audience: In a bid to define the target audience data is either manipulated or misused. Since clients are segmented there are chances of discriminating based on certain groups, gender, and religion for brand promotion.
In order to overcome the above issues let us see some good practises.
Honesty: Be honest about how much you know instead of assuming, keep an open mind while getting facts and also conduct a self-check against your beliefs.
Assumptions: Since a certain customer segment is targeted does not mean you assume about their culture or demographics. Conduct a detailed search of data and the audience that you are going to cater to and then join the dots so that you can customize your marketing strategize to suit the need and demand.
Ask Questions: good research requires questioning. Whether powerful or long ask questions wherein you get the information correctly. Accept your mistakes and ask your audience to correct. Remember communication is the key.
Respect Privacy: Since it is easy to access user data it is even easier to compromise. Inform people of the use of data. Be careful while dealing with third parties. Rules keep changing hence keep yourself aware of the changed policies.
Buying decisions are made on the basis of emotions. Psychology plays a very important role in marketing whether traditional or digital. Hence as digital marketers or consumers we need to be precautious while taking decisions.
References:
few articles which I would encourage you to read:
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