Ethical Blog Assignment

The number one thing you can do to avoid legal issues while advertising and marketing for a product is to make sure the advertisements are not false or misleading. Splenda missed the mark with this one as they claimed their product was "made from sugar".  The Sugar Association asked for an investigation into alternative sweetener Splenda's "Made from Sugar" slogan. It complained that the tagline was misleading, and that the sweetener is nothing more than "highly processed chemical compound made in a factory". In 2007, a resulting lawsuit led by the makers of rival sweetener Equal, settled against Splenda. Equal was looking for $200 million from Splenda in the settlement for unfair profits.  The lawsuit says the defendants are trying to convince consumers that Splenda is "unhealthy or unsafe," suggesting they'd be better off consuming refined sugar.  But a McNeil spokeswoman says sugar is indeed used to make one of the ingredients in Spl...

For an ad campaign to be considered socially responsible, the advertising used in the campaign must meet an ethical standard. Corporate social responsibility marketing has been a focus of several major ad campaigns, but if the ads used in the campaign are seen as deceptive by the public, the company is unlikely to be considered socially responsible regardless of the theme of the advertisements.  These days everyone knows that you can't take advertisements at face value. Photoshop, misleading wording, deliberate omission of certain facts -- all frequent techniques that advertisers use to toe the line while they're pushing their product down your throat. In 2012 Skechers paid a $40 million settlement  for its deceptive advertising for Shape-ups, Resistance Runner, Toners, and Tone-ups. They  claimed that tying your shoes was the only thing needed for weight loss.   According to the FTC, Skechers exaggerated claims regarding the shoes' effectiveness, specifically...

Adidas came under fire earlier this year  for perhaps the most poorly worded marketing email in history. The sports brand sent out an email congratulating runners who "survived" the Boston Marathon with the subject of the email reading: "Congrats, you survived the Boston Marathon!" People were outraged and critics slammed the email as insensitive in the wake of the 2013 bombing at the same marathon that killed three people and wounded dozens more. Adidas tried to make amends by sending out an apology email to the recipients of the original email. Adidas spokeswoman Maria Culp said. " We are incredibly sorry, c learly, there was no thought given to the insensitive email subject line we sent Tuesday. We deeply apologize for our mistake. The Boston Marathon is one of the most inspirational sporting events in the world. Every year we're reminded of the hope and resiliency of the running community at this event." (Peterson, 2017) Although this is just a...

Dove Body Wash Ad Current Ethically Concerning Ad (2017) There are tons of ethically concerning ads out in the world, if you take the time to watch this  Dove Body Wash Ad  you can see where the concern   comes from. This ad was posted to facebook and at the beginning   of the ad there is a black woman who removes her brown shirt and then underneath there is a white woman in a light shirt.   The Facebook ad, a three-second GIF, featured three women, each removing her shirt to reveal the next.   But it was the transition   from a black woman to a white woman that   caused people stop and call it racist. Race and ethnicity is, and will continue to be a touchy subject with a fine line to walk on for marketers. It seems as if  Dove is saying that black women are considered "dirty" and by using their products can be cleansed into whiteness, giving white women the superiority.  First Ethically Concerning Ad (2011) This...