Ethics in Advertising – Academician

Advertising Skills

Unit 4: Ethics in advertising

Criticism of Advertising – Controversial effects of advertising – Impact of Advertisements on children- Unethical use of women in advertising-Puffery – Shock – advertisements – Subliminal advertising- Regulating bodies in India. Ethical Aspects of Advertising in India; Role of Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI)

4.1. Meaning of ethics:[1]

Ethics, also called moral philosophy, is the discipline concerned with what is morally good and bad and morally right and wrong. The term is also applied to any system or theory of moral values or principles.

4.2. Meaning of advertising:[2]

Advertising is creating messages and using different psychological techniques to persuade and motivate someone to act, most likely to buy a product or service.

4.3. How does advertising work?

Advertising has a simple principle — get people interested in a product being sold.

After arousing interest, the goal is to persuade people to purchase the product, even if they hadn’t previously thought about buying it. Ads work by using psychology to influence the way people think and feel about a product or service.

4.4. Depending on the goals of your ad campaign, advertising can work for your company in a variety of ways:

To raise awareness of your brand
To drive potential customers to your business
To promote sales for both new and existing products
To introduce a new product or service to the market
To differentiate your product from your competitors’

Advertising can also be executed in various ways. Radio commercials, billboards, branded t-shirts, and social media endorsements all count as advertising.

4.5. Advertising ethics:[3]

Advertising ethics are the moral principles that govern how a business communicates with members of its target audience. Advertising has a set of defined principles that outline the type of communication that can take place between a potential buyer and a seller of goods or services. An example of ethical advertising is an ad that presents true statements in a decent manner, although the definition of decency may vary between individuals.

The purpose of advertising is to increase sales and generate more brand awareness. Good advertising can appeal to a wide audience and generate more demand for a product or service. Companies may claim that what they sell is better than what competitors sell, but ethics come into play when a business cannot back up their claims or use unacceptable methods to generate brand awareness.

Applying ethics in advertising can pose a challenge because the ethical beliefs that people hold vary, based on their background and moral beliefs. Certain regulations do apply to advertisers, who must exercise caution when creating ads to avoid facing legal issues or consumer backlash.

4.6. Criticism of Advertising:[4]

Main criticisms against advertising are: (1) increased price of the product, (2) multiplication of needs, (3) deceptive, (4) it leads to monopoly, (5) harmful for the society, (6) wastage of precious national resources!

Despite many benefits drawn from advertising, it suffers from a severe criticism advanced by different segments of society.

(1) Increased Price of The Product:

Advertising increases the cost of the product as the expenses on it form the part of the total cost of the product. The increased prices are borne by the consumers. But it cannot be denied that advertising leads to large scale production which considerably reduces the total and per unit cost of production. The consumer may pay less rather than higher.

(2) Multiplication of Needs:

Advertising creates artificial demand for the product and induces people to buy those products which are not needed by them. On account of its repetition, it allures and creates a desire in the minds of the people to possess an article not required by them.

(3) Deceptive:

Sometimes advertising is used as an instrument of cheating. In order to impress upon the people false statements are given with regard to different virtues of a product. Fraudulent means and deceptive practice are resorted to by various traders in order to sell their products. All these things adversely affect the public confidence in the advertising.

(4) It Leads to Monopoly:

Advertising sometimes leads to monopoly in a particular brand of a product. By investing large sums in advertising of his brand, a big producer eliminates small producers of the same product from the market and creates brand monopoly. This leads to exploitation of consumers.

But in reality, this argument does not hold good. The monopoly powers are temporarily acquired by the manufacturers as they face strong competition by the rival producers of the same product. In the words of Marry Hepner “advertisement stimulates competition. It often enables the small businessmen to compete with large concerns as well as to start new business”.

(5) Harmful for the Society:

Sometimes advertisements are un-ethical and objectionable. Most often, these carry indecent language and virtually nude photographs in order to attract the customers. This adversely affects the social values.

(6) Wastage of Precious National Resources:

A serious drawback levied against the advertisement is that it destroys the utility of certain products before their normal life. The latest and improved model of a product leads to the elimination of old ones. For instance, in the U.S.A., people like to possess the latest models of cars and discarding the old ones which are still in useable conditions. This leads to wastage of national resources.

4.7. Controversial effects of advertising:[5]

The persuasive role of advertising is presumed to have an impact on society’s values and life styles. In determining the ill-effects of advertising, there still remains the issue of whether advertising creates negative effect in the society or whether it merely reflects the values and attitudes that are already existing in society. Advertising is probably effective in creating an image rather than changing society’s values.

1. Promoting materialism

Advertising is accused of promoting materialism by inducing people to attach too much importance to the material aspects of life, it creates the notion that acquisition of material things will gratify basic and inner needs and aspirations of the people.

2. Advertisements are exploitative

Emotions, sensual feeling, self-centeredness, fear and lost for words, etc. are touched by advertisements. They also create negative feelings such as self-doubt, insecurity, envy, greed, lust, possessiveness and inferiority. It is better that they are rationally based, instead of thriving on emotional aspects of people.

3. Promoting Stereotypes

By portraying certain groups of individuals in certain roles, advertising becomes stereotyped. Women are usually portrayed as housewives or mothers. In a study done by the students of the Indian institute of Management, Ahmedabad, it was found that in a majority of advertisements, women are portrayed as housewives or as companions to men, thus apparently relegating them to a secondary role. Only in some cases they were shown as business executives or professionals.

Certain stereotypes may easily be spotted. In a number of advertisements, business executives are shown with cigars, which could be avoided. Also, a large number of cigarette advertisements in India include women, either to give an impression of a kind of sanctity provided by them, or to create a romantic situation.

4. Advertisements are ‘children-centered’

Most advertisements are children-centered. Advertisement on chewing gums, chocolates, toys and tattoos, etc., use children. The well-to-do can afford to buy them for their wards. But what about the millions of low income and lower-middle income group children living in India, who have absolutely no means to buy them?

The major issues are whether TV advertising to children is unfair, whether it causes children to make poor product decisions, whether it increases parent-child conflict, and whether it results in undesirable socialization of children.

5. Advertising to Children

It is argued that children are more susceptible to deception that adults have and cannot objectively evaluate advertisements. Thus, there is substantial scope for manipulation of children through television advertising. Because of children’s limited ability to interpret the selling intent of a message or identify a commercial, critics charge that advertising to them is inherently unfair and deceptive and should be severely restricted.

6. Advertising and Sensitivity to Price

There is a belief that advertising reduce the consumers’ sensitivity to the price on brands that closely resemble one another. However, a study has shown that the relative price elasticity increases with an increase in advertising, implying that advertising actually increases sensitivity to price.

7. Inferior goods

Advertisements for inferior goods are sometimes flashed in a high-profile manner. Several joint stock companies during 1994-95 lured investors to subscribe to their public issues. But for their high-gear advertisements, people would not have invested in such companies’ shares which are now totally worthless.

8. Advertising Creates Insecurity

Advertising can make people unduly worry about greying of hair, body complexion and odor, etc. They make them lack in self-confidence unnecessarily.

4.8. Impact of Advertisements on children:[6]

Positive effects of advertisements on children:

Advertising makes children endless variety of free information about different products.
Advertising makes the kids aware of the new products available in the market.
Children can learn moral lessons.

Negative effects of advertising:

Children adopt impulses buying behavior from childhood onwards.
By seeing different stunts, children also try to perform dangerous stunts.
Children demanding luxurious lifestyle.
Children are addicted to eat more junk food after watching junk food varieties in advertisement, Childhood obesity increases worldwide.
Children wasting much of their valuable time in watching TV.
Children are becoming more arrogant & irritable when they did not get their desired product.
Children are facing health problems after watching TV like eye sight problems, headache, and black circle around eyes.
Children learn more violence while watching cartoons like -Tom & Jerry whenever tom get hurt, they feel happier this type of tendency won’t give better impact in future.
As a human tendency negative point are attracted more than positive points, as children with immature brain get attracted more to the negative side and overlook the positive aspects.

4.9. Unethical use of women in advertising:

Portrayal of women in advertising:[7]

Advertisement is one of the major medias that affect our daily life consciously and unconsciously. It is also responsible to play a significant role in shaping the society in a much broader perspective. There is a lot of disputes on the issue that whether advertisements depict what is prevalent in the society or the society embraces in itself what is portrayed in the advertisements and other media. Over the last few decades, there has been a great socio-cultural change in the society especially in the context of role and position of women in the society. There are increasing numbers of women pursuing careers of their choice, changing role in the family structure, negative attitude towards gender-role stereotypes etc. But has the representation of women in advertisements changed over a period of time? Or does it still confirm to some traditional notions about women and their role in the society? Such stereotypes projected about women go a long way in deciding what the society thinks about women and how the society treats women in the long run.

There is a contrast between how males and females are portrayed in advertisements. This difference in portrayal has nothing to do with biology or natural traits, but with how our culture defines feminine and masculine. The gender roles that women play in advertisements are the decorative role, recreational role, independent career role, self- involved role, carefree role and family roles. Women are generally found in advertisements for home products, baby items, cosmetics and food items.

Since ages, women have been reflected in stereotypical roles. She has been highlighted as “her place is in the home, they don’t make important decisions, are regarded as being dependent on men. Women were stereotyped in the advertisements in the aspects of “objectifying women”, “showing women as subordinate to men”, and as “mentally withdrawn from the larger scene”.

Gradually this portrayal of women changed shape and in late 70’s, women were reflected as employed. Representation of women in advertisements has been experiencing a shift from the housewife centric advertisements to the career women advertisements. But female models are increasingly shown in advertisements to sell products that may or may not be directly related to them. The images of women are always attractive – who provides the desirable image for the advertisement, irrespective of her importance to the advertisement.

Even today, the images of women found in advertisements and commercials have the touch of the traditional homemaker. Women are seen as the beloved wife when she is able to cook good food, excellent daughter-in-law when she follows the traditions of her mother-in-law and a great mother when she takes good care of her children.

There is the difference in the portrayal of women in Asian countries as compared to that in the US and other western countries. While the portrayal of women in non-working roles is consistent with various findings of the studies conducted in China, Thailand, Hongkong and Turkey but the recent studies in America revealed the predominance of work- related roles of women in the advertisements. In the Indian context also, there is a lot of difference in the projection of women as compared to other nations as the common stereotypical portrayals seem less prevalent in Indian advertisements. Women were portrayed in neutral ways. Although there is a difference in the product categories advertised by women, but they are still portrayed more in traditional and stereotyped roles.

The latest advertisements on health drinks, detergent cakes and powders, soaps, medicines, cosmetics, mobike advertisements have represented women in a very rigorous way – very energetic, dynamic, strong and enthusiastic. Majority of modern Indian advertisements present a more realistic and balanced picture of a woman. There has been a general shift whereby advertisements have moved from showcasing women merely as tradition bound homemakers to those playing modern roles.

There is a shift in the portrayal of the woman in advertisements from a mere housewife to a career-oriented and professional with the independent identity and multiple identities, who is a super woman successful in balancing her personal and professional life.

4.10. Puffery in Advertising[8]

Puffery refers to a usually harmless amount of exaggeration in sales and marketing materials. However, some claims can go too far and cross the thin line into false advertising.

Have you ever been to a restaurant that claimed to have the best pie in the world? Or run across a blog post promising the most valuable read of your life?

Maybe you’ve seen advertisements for the softest mattress, the warmest sweaters, or the fastest cars.

These claims are all examples of a type of advertisement known as puffery.

In digital advertising, puffery is all about exaggerating and stretching the truth about a product or service in a harmless way.

However, there are legal dangers associated with puffery and your brand can suffer real harm if used incorrectly.

What is Puffery Advertising?

The term “puffery” first originated in 1893 in an English Court of Appeals.

The case involved a manufacturer’s promise to pay customers £100 if the flu was contracted after using their product. A consumer who was not reimbursed sued the company for making false claims.

The manufacturing company claimed the advertisement was “puff” and not meant to be taken literally.

While the court ultimately disagreed with the manufacturing company, it did set a legal precedent that some advertising promises weren’t meant as serious claims, and puffery was created.

In a modern definition, puffery refers to the use of exaggeration and hyperbole, sometimes to extreme levels, to promote a product or service.

Puffery advertising examples in common marketing and sales phrases include:

The best product for the job
Tastes or looks the best
Lasts longer than other brands
Best in the world
The last product you’ll need
Never go back to other brands

Have you ever been to a restaurant that claimed to have the best pie in the world? Or run across a blog post promising the most valuable read of your life?

Maybe you’ve seen advertisements for the softest mattress, the warmest sweaters, or the fastest cars.

These claims are all examples of a type of advertisement known as puffery.

In digital advertising, puffery is all about exaggerating and stretching the truth about a product or service in a harmless way.

However, there are legal dangers associated with puffery and your brand can suffer real harm if used incorrectly.

Why Puffery Works?

You may be wondering what is the value of puffery for brands.

After all, isn’t it better to promote factual statements with empirical data than make lofty claims?

While this way of thinking makes sense on the surface, puffery is often utilized in advertising for a few different reasons.

First and foremost, puffery works. Advertising slogans that use puffery and exaggerated language see high returns on investments.

Grab the Attention of Consumers

Puffery grabs the attention of consumers and helps them make quick decisions regarding a product.

People don’t want to digest complex marketing slogans, and the quick “best product in the world” claims are a fast way to convince customers to give your brand a try.

Puffery Advertising Examples

1. Red Bull

In 2014, the energy drink company Red Bull lost a $13 million lawsuit for false advertising.

The company had made claims that their product improved concentration and reaction speeds in consumers, which the brand said was just puffery advertising.

However, courts disagreed and stated that there was no way for those claims to be scientifically proven to be true, even if they might be accurate in some consumers for a short period of time.

The mistake Red Bull made is a classic in puffery advertising examples where the line was crossed — they were too specific.

By making claims of precise improvements their product could deliver, the advertisement went from subjective to objective.

2. Starbucks

The coffee giant Starbucks was sued for making the claim that Starbucks coffee was “The Best Coffee for the Best You”.

The basis behind the lawsuit was that Starbucks used pesticides and chemicals to kill bugs in stores, which made the advertisement for perfect coffee untrue and misleading.

Courts quickly found in favor of Starbucks, stating in the ruling that the language used in advertisements was legal puffery, and that the claims Starbucks was making in no way would mislead a customer about the types of pesticides used in stores.

While Starbucks was eventually found to be innocent of false advertising, the brand still took a hit as criticism of store cleaners and pesticides came into public light.

4.11. Shock advertising or Shockvertising

Shock advertising, also known as shockvertising, is a unique tactic where advertisers use provocative, taboo subjects and images to grab the public’s attention. Advertisers use this method because it incites strong feelings about the given advertisement. The audience feels strongly about the advertisement, which makes them much more likely to share and discuss it as well as remember it. In turn, this generates more brand awareness.[9]

Risks of Shock Advertising

Although more brand awareness sounds like a great thing for a company, doing it through shock advertising can be a risk. It does have the potential to backfire, as there is a fine line between tastefully disturbing or shocking and downright unacceptable. Shock advertising aims to toe this line without crossing it. This advertising method seeks to reach a large audience, so the advertisement going poorly can be detrimental to a company’s reputation. These advertisements can be incredibly offensive to certain groups, and there is a chance that the audience deems it unacceptable.

4.12. Subliminal Advertising

A subliminal message is an audio or visual stimulus that’s not perceived by your conscious mind. They’re often put into songs, films or adverts, as they can be used to enhance the persuasiveness of something – or convey something else entirely.[10]

Subliminal messages are below the threshold of conscious perception. You can picture your subconscious mind the same way as an iceberg, with far more mass below the surface than above. As the subconscious or unintentional aspect of your mind represents around 90% of your total brain function, it’s clearly way more powerful than your conscious mind when it comes to processing information.

Subliminal advertisement examples:

1. The Amazon logo

It’s a logo you’ve seen a million times, so where’s the subliminal message? Well, have you ever noticed that the arrow points from the ‘a’ to the ‘z’, telling your subconscious mind that you can literally get anything from Amazon? Plus, the arrow looks like a smile, subliminally making you feel good about the brand, so two messages are hidden in one device.

2. The FedEx logo

Bet you’ve never clocked this one – FedEx makes clever use of negative space – look between the ‘E’ and the ‘x’, and what do you spot? Yep, another arrow. Created by Landor Associated design bureau in 1994, it’s received more than 40 design awards and was mentioned in a run-down of the top 10 best emblems by Rolling Stone magazine.

3. Toblerone

The Toblerone logo isn’t really subliminally selling you anything – unlike FedEx’s subtle promise of speedy deliveries and Amazon’s that you’ll be able to buy anything from A-Z. Look closely at the mountain range, which mimics the chocolate’s distinctively-shaped chunks, and you’ll be able to find a bear standing on its hind legs. Bern, the Swiss capital where the Toblerone bar was created, is called the ‘City of Bears’ and the bear features on its coat of arms – the logo thus pays tribute to the bar’s birthplace.

4.13. Regulating bodies in India.

Advertising has become a serious and big business in the last few years. The advertising business is growing at a considerable rate. Several legislations control the content of advertising. Some of the principal legislations are[11] –

• Cable Television Networks (Regulation) Act, 1955

• Press Council of India Act, 1978

• Cable Television Networks (Amendment) Rules, 2006

Some prominent, prohibitory legal provisions regulate advertising.

In 1985, the Advertising Standards Council of India (“ASCI”), a non-statutory tribunal, created a self-regulatory mechanism for ensuring ethical advertising practices. ASCI is a voluntary Self-regulation council. The members comprise advertisers, Media, Advertising Agencies and other Professional/Ancillary services connected with advertising practice. ASCI entertained and disposed of complaints based on its Code of Advertising Practice (“ASCI Code”).

This Code applies to advertisements read, heard or viewed in India even if they originate or are published abroad so long as they are directed to consumers in India or are exposed to a significant number of consumers in India.

4.14. Ethical Aspects of Advertising in India

In the olden days, few firms were engaged in producing and distributing goods and services and never bothered to advertise much. So, the message was straight and clear. But with the enormous growth of the business evolution of market economies, the competition turned more ruthless, if not uglier. The rapid changes in the market environment drive marketers to explore unique and innovative advertising paths and the urge to embrace even unethical and immoral means in advertising, with little consideration for social and ethical values.

Ethics are moral standards or principles against which one’s behaviour is judged. It broadly includes Honesty, Integrity, Fairness and Sensitivity. Though ethics is always a matter of personal values and interpretation, there are specific ethical standards governing the conduct of individuals and organizations in the society.[12]

Ethical advertising should have the following:

1. No place for deception and puffery.

2. Ads aimed at children should be controlled since it promotes superficiality. It influences children’s demands for everything they watch on TV.

3. Advertisers promoting theme parks and casinos etc. in the pretext of action shows in TV without revealing the sponsor’s name amounts to influencing children.

4. Promotion of controversial products, gambling, and wagering in the media should be checked.

To maintain and enhance the public’s confidence in advertising. ASCI seek to ensure that advertisements conform to its Code for Self-Regulation, which requires advertisements to be:[13]

Honest Representations – Truthful and Honest to consumers and competitors.
Non-Offensive to Public – Within the bounds of generally accepted standards of public decency and propriety.
Against Harmful Products/Situations – Not used indiscriminately for the promotion of products, hazardous or harmful to society or to individuals particularly minors, to a degree unacceptable to society at large.
Fair in Competition – Not derogatory to competition. No plagiarism.

4.15. Role of the Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI)[14]

ASCI’s goals include monitoring, administering and promoting standards of advertising practices in India with a view to:

To ensure truthfulness and honesty of representations and claims made through advertising and safeguarding against misleading advertising.
To ensure that advertising is not offensive to generally accepted norms and standards of public decency.
To safeguard against indiscriminate use of advertising for the promotion of products or services that are generally regarded as hazardous to society or individuals or unacceptable to society as a whole.
To ensure that advertisements observe fairness in competition and the canons of generally accepted competitive behavior.
To codify adopt and from time to time modify the code of advertising practices in India and implement, administer, promote and publicize such a code.
To promote, maintain and uphold fair, sound, ethical and healthy principles and practices of advertising.
To promote a better understanding of the benefits of fair, sound and ethical advertising amongst the practitioners of advertising and in society at large.
To represent, protect, inform and guide members of the company on matters relating to advertising.
To foster and promote cooperation amongst persons or companies engaged and involved in advertising.

NB: This material is for educational purpose, and for private circulation. Readers are requested to follow prescribe text books, for further insights and understandings. The material needs upgradation with time and may become outdated in the due course of time, and may become irrelevant with future time.

[1] https://www.britannica.com/topic/ethics-philosophy

[2] https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/advertising

[3] https://www.indeed.com/career-advice/career-development/advertising-ethics

[4] https://www.yourarticlelibrary.com/advertising/6-main-criticisms-against-advertising-explained/25869

[5] https://accountlearning.com/controversial-effects-advertising/

[6] https://www.ijsdr.org/papers/IJSDR1607047.pdf

[7] Chatley, P. (2018). Portrayal of women in advertising. IMPACT: IJRHAL, 6(7), 15–18. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/350276831_PORTRAYAL_OF_WOMEN_IN_ADVERTISING

[8] https://rockcontent.com/blog/puffery-advertising-examples/

[9] https://seodesignchicago.com/advertising-blog/what-is-shockvertising-and-does-it-work/

[10] https://www.audionetwork.com/content/the-edit/inspiration/subliminal-advertising

[11] https://ficci.in/Sedocument/20240/Survey_on_Advertising_Standards.pdf

[12] https://www.abacademies.org/articles/ethical-issues-in-advertising-13279.html