Beyond the Dark Arts

The following sections are included:

• Preface
• Acknowledgements
• About the Editors
• About the Contributors
• Contents

Marketing and communication are blamed a lot for the ills of the world. These disciplines contribute to rampant consumption, causing degradation of the environment and the concomitant uncontrolled growth putting profits before people and the planet. The academic disciplines of marketing and communication are at a crossroads, needing to balance responsibility to society and the biosphere with the need for economic sustainability. The nexus of marketing, communication, ethical and societal responsibility is a conflictual and dynamic space. This chapter introduces a book that shows how some are meeting the challenges of enacting responsible marketing and communication at the crossroads.

This chapter explores the concepts of ethics, morals and social responsibility from organisational and societal perspectives covering both marketing that is focused on profit and marketing focused on bringing about social benefit. It discusses the meanings of social responsibility from different paradigmatic viewpoints and highlights the advantages and limitations of particular approaches. The chapter also considers some aspects of legal and regulatory frameworks and the potential for the development of codes of conduct for socially responsible for-profit marketing and social marketing. The discussion is positioned in a global context and is grounded by intercultural considerations and the diversity of ethical perspectives and norms across cultures.

Emerging technologies (e.g., augmented reality, virtual reality) have changed the way that people interact. Artificial intelligence and machine learning can be used for personalised targeting and predicting what people “want” or “need” before they even know it themselves. With these tools comes the possibility of manipulation, deceit or the production of harmful results through errors and misuse. User participation with these technologies can also have unintended consequences, leading to questions of shared social responsibility between social marketers, users and technology creators. In the race to do exciting and helpful things with these technologies, ethical issues can be an afterthought. This chapter argues for nuanced analyses of social responsibility and ethics, taking seriously the role of technology throughout social marketing campaign conception, design and implementation.

Evaluation in public relations has typically followed programme logic models which are organisation centric and focused on achieving organisational objectives. This raises numerous ethical issues about the focus of public relations work, how stakeholders are regarded, the process of communication and the measures of success. In the contemporary context, such an approach is open to even more ethical challenge, especially with the rise of new organisational accountabilities and the ubiquity of online communication. This chapter outlines the ethical issues associated with prevalent evaluation models and advocates for a new approach which places context and stakeholders at the centre of evaluation practices.

Digital technologies are becoming a more common part of behaviour change initiatives and campaigns. However, digital solutions can themselves present risks and challenges. In this chapter, we draw on the concept of technological solutionism to consider issues and shortcomings for behaviour change campaigns. We use the case of Florence, the World Health Organization’s “virtual health worker” who is designed to help people quit smoking, to spotlight how technologies operationalise social issues; the risk of embedded biases within technological solutions; and assumptions about digital access. While Florence is very efficient and always available, the experience overlooks some of the inherently “human” aspects of tobacco cessation, even if they are non-rational or time-consuming. The chapter encourages behaviour change practitioners to think critically about technologically enabled solutions and to be mindful of issues that can be embedded within them.

In recent decades, Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) has moved steadily up boardroom agendas, but the launch of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which cover a wide range of social, economic and environmental goals, by the United Nations in 2016, presents an unprecedented challenge for the corporate world. This chapter offers an exploratory and illustrative review of how the UK’s four largest retailers are addressing the SDGs. While all four of the UK’s largest retailers have emphasised their commitment to the SDGs, the chapter concludes that the retailers need to address a number of major challenges if they are to make a lasting contribution to the SDGs, and that their current approach reflects some elements of the dark side of marketing communications.

This chapter unpacks the challenges faced in marketing sustainable fashion products within an industry fuelled by perpetual reinvention and growth. In recent decades, the fashion industry, but most notably fast fashion, has been mired in controversies ranging from environmental sustainability to the exploitation of cheap labour and disregard for workers’ health and safety. In parallel, increasing consumer demand has emerged for sustainable fashion options, which has led to a rapidly growing but diverging market. Adopting the three R’s — Reduce, Reuse and Recycle — this chapter explores the complexities involved in (1) the promotion of reduced consumption and demarketing, (2) the rising popularity of second-hand/vintage clothing, fashion libraries and the use of deadstock fabrics, and (3) recycling and upcycling. Barriers faced by marketers in promoting these more sustainable options are examined in considering paths forward to more sustainable practices.

People of Culturally and Linguistically Diverse (CALD) backgrounds, representing around 28 per cent of Australians and hundreds of ethnic backgrounds and language groups, are often overlooked or under-considered in health communication campaigns. This diversity presents challenges for those wishing to successfully communicate health messages, particularly given the fragmenting communications landscape. The COVID-19 pandemic has brought to light many of these challenges and the, often, limited consideration given to CALD communities in communicating urgent health messages. This chapter reviews the Victorian government’s innovative CALD Youth Content Campaign which engaged social media influencers to communicate COVID-19 messages through channels not ordinarily accessible to government communication teams. From this case study, we draw insights for future health campaigns aimed at diverse audiences.

In this chapter, employing a systematic review and thematic analysis of business literature, we explore the notion of vulnerability and its representations in the context of modern slavery in supply chains. At the micro level, vulnerability is predominantly represented as an outcome of one behaviour — migration — simplifying the myriad of external push-and-pull factors, other behaviours and social relationships. At the meso level, situational risks are clustered around various conditions of employment. At the macro level, a broad set of systemic issues were identified to contribute to the environment in which a heightened risk of vulnerability to modern slavery is experienced. We conclude this chapter by identifying wider implications of our findings for social marketing and social and behaviour change communication as well as avenues for future research.

Brands are capitalising on outrage via social media platforms to gain attention and influence behaviour, all while furthering commercial gain. The strategic use of polarising content constitutes a dynamic era of brand performance, often emerging via brand activism. The goal of modern activist messaging is to break into filter bubbles and keep users engaged and responsive. In this way, brand strategy has evolved to tap into consumer social needs such as belongingness as part of marketing and communications. This chapter describes the cycle that brands enter when they begin to create polarising branded content, the consumer response and the threats inherent in the brand takeover of social discontent.

In this chapter, we discuss diversity and inclusivity in advertising. Based on theories of socialisation, social influence and attitude formation, we explain how advertising messages impact on the target and broader audiences using the case of a 2020 TRESemmé advertising campaign for haircare products in South Africa. The advertising campaign posted by a major pharmaceutical retail chain (Clicks) on their website described black people’s hair as “frizzy & dull hair” and “dry & damaged hair”, in comparison to white people’s hair, which was labelled as “normal hair” and “fine & flat hair”. The campaign resulted in public outrage and protests because many perceived it to be racist, offensive and distasteful. We deconstruct the advertisement and analyse the ensuing fallout using publicly available resources. The advertisement had an unintended message emanating from the use of the textual content and the race of the models used. Given that incidents like this are not uncommon, we conclude that diversity and inclusivity interventions need to be taken more seriously in advertising.

Playing computer games is now a mainstream pastime that touches every demographic. Advances in computer technology and internet speeds have seen a proliferation of popular online games and related activities such as game streaming and localised and international esports tournaments. The growth in the media landscape for online games has opened a plethora of digital marketing opportunities within these spaces. However, this growth is combined with the potential health risks that come with increased screen time and sedentary behaviour. With a focus on emerging adults (EAs) aged 18–25, this chapter explores engagement with online games. Using a behavioural ecological approach, the chapter explores a range of influences that intersect with EAs’ use of online games and the impact that these influences can have on EAs’ real-life behaviours. The chapter discusses opportunities for social marketing through online games and highlights the need for further work in understanding and using online games and related activities in changing behaviour.

Social media has brought rapid and widespread changes to the way individuals and organisations communicate and interact. This includes the use of social media as a tool for advocacy, activism and support of social movements. While also offering social marketers opportunities to shape upstream environments, discussions of social media’s application to upstream social marketing are nascent. This chapter focuses on how social media can be leveraged by social marketers to encourage change to policy and broader environmental contexts. In particular, the chapter focuses on the practice of social listening — acknowledging both communication and marketing perspectives on this practice. A case where social media has played a key role in fostering and delivering policy change is presented to illustrate these concepts. The chapter closes with a discussion of ethical challenges and considerations associated with using social media for upstream social marketing.

Social media has become a key information source for most consumers. However, as social media platforms are not highly regulated, it has given rise to mass amounts of health misinformation. Many unqualified people, typically social media influencers, are profiting from sharing non-evidence-based messages and qualified health professionals are unable to match their audience engagement. However, social media also holds the potential to be used to promote evidence-based messages to large audiences and contribute to positive change within society. The application of machine learning and natural language processing techniques to understand social media data is common, with increasing health research applications. There are many challenges and opportunities for health as the world progresses through the digital era. This chapter aims to present the potential applications, benefits, and issues of using social media within the health and nutrition space based on the collective expertise of a multidisciplinary team from nutrition, social marketing and data science.

How an organisation responds to crises and disasters has significant implications, for not only its reputation and brand but also its business continuity. We propose that four important considerations, power, honesty, transparency and timeliness, must be addressed when designing crisis communication. We then discuss how failure to give these priority can lead to emotional contagion, conspiracy theories, moral panics and fake news. We conclude by proposing that if crisis communication management is to be effective, then not only should it be ethical and socially responsible but also contingent, stakeholder centric and involving cycles of sensemaking and sense giving.