Page 189 - The Handbook of Persuasion and Social Marketing

Ethical Issues of Social Marketing and Persuasion 181

Problem Questions for Corporate social marketers
Marketing has Are any individuals or groups harmed by the social
unintended marketing?
consequences Is the social marketplace harmed in any way by the
social marketing campaign?
Does the social marketing campaign have any
negative consequences?
Corporate social Is the company benefiting substantially enough to
marketing is a misuse maintain the initiative over time so that it is a win/win
of shareholder assets situation for company and cause?
Companies are meddling Is society better off because of the program?
in areas in which they Has corporate involvement allowed this program to
have insufficient skills perform better than it would if it were managed by
only a nonprofit organization or a government
agency?
Companies cherry-pick Are some important causes being neglected by
the attractive causes corporate social marketers?
Are some causes receiving undue attention and
monopolizing corporate social marketing efforts?
Corporate social Are company leaders sending subtle or not so subtle
marketing creates a signals that they will withdraw their support if they
chilling effect on disagree with stances taken by nonprofit and public
nonprofits leaders?
Companies wield too Is decision-making collaborative and inclusive of all
much power partners?
Are all partners sharing/receiving the credit and
publicity that they are due?
Are public and nonprofit partners treated respectfully
and fairly?
Companies spend too Is the advertising-to-donation ratio responsible,
much on the marketing ethical, and representative of good stewardship?
and donate too little to
the cause
Note. Partially adapted from “Ethical Issues in Social Marketing” by P. Murphy and P.
Bloom, in S. Fine, (Ed.), Social Marketing: Promoting the Causes of Public and Nonprofit
Agencies (pp. 68–78), 1990, Boston, MA: Allyn and Bacon. Copyright 1990 by Allyn and
Bacon. Adapted by permission of Seymour Fine.