Advertisements
Every organization is in business for money. Business owners are looking for ways to increase productivity and profits to benefit themselves and shareholders. Therefore, businesses will look for the most creative means of marketing their products to attract more customers to them. Therefore, advertising is very crucial to the success of any business organization. However, advertising has its pros and cons. The line between ethical advertisements and unethical advertisements is often ill-defined (Cossia, 2018). According to the U.S Federal Trade Commission, ethical advertising is truthful, fair, backed by evidence, and not deceptive. Advertisers are required to follow the four rules to promote the truth in their advertisements.
Advertising is moral and useful because it is possible to market your products and services effectively without deceiving consumers or telling lies to deceive consumers into purchasing your goods and services. Ethical or moral advertising encompasses being aware of the truth about your products and being respectful of that truth. Truthful advertising does not conceal the defects of a product or try to stretch its capabilities. Ethical advertising does not encompass hidden agendas (Cossia, 2018). It does not try to indirectly plant deceitful information into the subconscious minds of the consumers or audience. Advertising is moral and useful because when it is ethical, it finds a way to show the audience the difference between the product being marketed and other competing products. It indicates the uniqueness of that product. The product’s logo makes it easier for buyers to identify it due to its imagery and overall tone, therefore, eliminating the capability of deceit and confusion with other products.
Secondly, advertising plays a big role in what consumers purchase but the one thing advertising does not do is force people to buy a product (Cossia, 2018). In fact, it is illegal for manufacturers and sellers to mislead consumers into buying products or services. Advertising is what influences consumers to decide what to purchase, hence the most important feature in advertising is ethics and morality. It is beneficial and useful although some points do not match with the ethical standards of advertising.
Thirdly, the only role or function of advertising is persuasion. In a moral appraisal of a marketing message, a difference between moral and immoral persuasion and rational and irrational advertising can be made (Christians, et al., 2020). Rational persuasion is consistent with the consumers’ autonomy and thus moral. Some forms of irrational advertising can have adverse effects on the autonomy of the consumer and should, therefore, be viewed as immoral.
Morality in Advertising is related to the nature and purpose of the advertisement. Sometimes exaggerating the advertisement is the key to proving the usefulness of the product (Cassia, 2018). For example, a sanitary towel advertisement which shows that when the sanitary towel was dropped in water by some ladies, the towel soaked whole water. Hence, the purpose of advertising was to inform women about the quality of the sanitary towels. Obviously, every woman is aware that such cannot practically occur but the advertisement was accepted. This does not indicate that the advertisement was immoral or unethical.
Fifth, morality and ethics in advertising depends on the consumer’s beliefs. If the marketers make the advertisements based on the assumption that consumers will understand, convince them to think, and act on their advertisements, this will definitely result in positive outcomes and the advertisement may not be regarded as unethical (Christians, et al., 2020). But at the same time, if marketers believe that they can deceive the consumers, through showing impossible things like just snapping their fingers will automatically make your house or office furnished fully or getting a lottery ticket will make them rich, then this is deceitful and will fail to work out because it would be called unethical thus immoral.
Sixth, advertisements should follow truthfulness, upholding human dignity, and social responsibility as the three main principles in advertising. Generally, big organizations do not lie because they have to prove their points to the market and consumers as well as various regulatory bodies (Christians, et al., 2020). Truth always exists but not completely. Sometimes not revealing the entire truth in the advertisement is the best option, but at times there has to be truth for betterment. For example, children are the major sellers of advertisements and products. They are the best at convincing buyers because they have the power. But when children are used in advertisements, the advertisers should remember not to show them doing their work by themselves such as playing, brushing teeth or infants holding a bottle of milk on their own because everyone knows that no reasonable person would leave their child unsupervised and unattended while doing these activities. Hence, involving parents or adults in activities or things being done during the advertisement would be more logical.
In conclusion, nowadays, advertisements are heavily exaggerated and puffing is overused. It could be because advertisers choose to ignore the knowledge of ethics and moral principles. They are more concerned with making more money. Their interest is to increase sales, the demand for the product, and gain customers by presenting a puffed advertisement that is well decorated and colorful. Advertisers claim that the product is the best in the market, with unique qualities, affordable and beneficial to the consumers. Many of these advertisements are deceitful and mislead buyers, which makes them unethical. But most of these ads are found to be false, misleading customers, and unethical.
References
Coccia, E. (2018). Goods: Advertising, Urban Space, and the Moral Law of the Image. Fordham Univ Press.
Christians, C. G., Fackler, M., Richardson, K. B., & Kreshel, P. (2020). Media ethics: Cases and moral reasoning. Routledge.