Wild Card

  Advertising Ethics

 When someone enters marketing as a career path, typically they do not ponder and think of the ethical rewards that they will be achieving. Marketing is a very profitable field, where profit is the main focus. Ethics and Morals are typically not at the front of a CEO's mind when trying to run a business. Listed below are two very different circumstances, where one company made ethical strides in the right direction, while the other made questionable choices. 

1.) Unilever is one of the largest companies owning over 400 brands. Unilever is one of the largest
companies owning over 400 brands. Unilever owns brands such as Dove, Coca-Cola, McDonalds, and Ben& Jerry ice cream. 

Unilever is known as a very ethical company with many of their companies beginning to have more ethical campaigns. An example of this would be Dove's "Campaign for Real Beauty." Last month, on April 21st, Unilever made a statement claiming that they will now stop advertising their Magnum and Ben& Jerry ice cream products to anyone below the age of 16. Because childhood obesity is such a large problem in America (and even worldwide), their change in advertising is a step in the right direction. 

Unilever will not only restrict its advertising through cable and social media ads, but will be restricting the use of influencers who are underage, or who have a target audience of under 16 years old to promote their products. Even though this sounds like an unsound marketing decision, this is a step in the right direction for the company. Also, this positive publicity may in the end help sell more of their ice cream products like Ben and Jerry ice cream and Magnum ice cream. 

2.) The next company that will be mentioned is a nonprofit whose business directions are leading them into some hot water. The crisis text line markets itself as a mental health support line that helps anyone in need. This is a "tech-driven nonprofit that uses big data and artificial intelligence to help people cope with traumas such as self-harm, emotional abuse, and thoughts of suicide." The organization is using the data that it collects from the patients and is selling it to create a new type of customer service software. These people are sharing their darkest moments with an app that is supposed to bring them hope and peace. This app markets itself as a helping hand for people who truly are in their lowest of lows. 

   The text line then uses this data to make a profit. Not only that, but the Crisis Text Line shares its data with a company called Loris.ai. Loris.ai is a software company that is making this profitability possible. Loris.ai and Crisis Text line not only share revenue, but Crisis Text Line also owns part of Loris.Ai's company's stake. The nonprofit and the software company have shared a CEO for 2 years. This is a disgusting invasion of millions of individuals' lives. Privacy experts from the Politico site state that other online data websites have easily been hacked and have been able to trace records back to specific individuals.

   If this proves to be true, this would be detrimental to the people who told their deepest darkest secrets to the place where they were supposed to receive help. Shawn Rodriguez who is the Crisis Text Line's VP states that their partnership with the for-profit subsidiary Loris.Ai is "ethically sound."

“These are people at their worst moments. Using that data to help other people is one thing, but commercializing it just seems like a real ethical line for a nonprofit to cross.”

Jennifer King, privacy and data policy fellow at Stanford University

    Even though both of these companies are completely different, and one is focusing on bettering their overall brand, while the other focuses on profit- both are on completely different sides of the Ethical Debate for advertising.