Six cool things happen when you practice ethical marketing
Does Marketing Really Matter?
Let’s be honest here
In my last post, I talked about the importance of Ethical Marketing, stressing the fact that the way you market matters.
If I could get 1 eur for every email that makes me cringe, I’d be a billionaire by now.
Yeah, I know, I’m exaggerating, but you know what I mean. Those mails screaming at you to spend money on a program or product are really annoying. You know, those ‘Only 5 Seats Left’ ‘You don’t want to miss this opportunity’ or ‘The clock is ticking!’ mails.
There’s absolutely no reason to manipulate people with urgency and scarcity tactics.
But, as marketers and business owners, we’ve all learned that this is the only way to get sales and are even told that it’s not sleazy because people WANT to be reminded. Hhmm, really? Do they? Do YOU want to be reminded to spend money?
Maybe because life happens and we get caught up in stuff and we may actually WANT to be reminded, but daily mails counting down to the deadline are overkill and will only hurt your brand’s reputation because that’s spam.
If you don’t know, spam is actually pressed ham in a can which I’ve never ever tried, not even as a meat eater up until 1992. So yeah, honestly, who wants to consume that crap? it’s just plain gross!
So, now that you know what spam really is, want to know what happens when you serve it? Other than not have any willing guests for your next dinner party?
You sound and look desperate and insecure when you put that kind of pressure on strangers.
What happens when you do that? You’ll lose subscribers and potential customers. Now, if they weren’t the right customers, no big deal, but if they were, uh oh!
But this is all pretty obvious, right?
So let’s now concentrate on the positive effects. What happens when you Do practice ethical Marketing?
These 6 Things Happen when Ethical Marketing is Practiced
#1: Sales Increase
#2: Pricing is Normalized
#3: Accessibility Increases
#4: Competition Becomes Fair
#5: Speed Increases in the Supply Chains
#6: Production Regulations Become Stricter
#1: Sales Increase for the Good Guys
If you concentrate on making marketing fun instead of urgent and spammy, you’ll attract the right customers faster and more easily.
The more real human connections you make via Ethical Marketing, the less bots and popups you’ll need.
If more companies practice Ethical Marketing, we’ll all be ‘deprogrammed’ from the manipulation as consumers and only the authentic brands will survive, weeding out the sleazy competition.
Ethical Marketing:
Treating Humans as Humans, not Machines!
#2: Pricing is Normalized
If larger brands produce ethically to meet the demand of the masses, this will decrease prices across the board.
As an example, the normal pet owner is not willing to spend a lot of money on an ethically and ergonomically-made dog bed, but if more pet supply brands started only manufacturing quality beds, the supply would increase and therefore, the price decrease.
And as soon as they start to produce more ethically, they’ll have to turn to ethical marketing practices, realizing that their older ways no longer work well because their customers are becoming more conscious about all aspects of their business, not just the production side.
#3: Accessibility Increases
If more ethical products are on major store shelves (online and off), the inconvenience factor of shopping consciously will decrease and sales will increase.
But what we’re seeing now is that most ethically-made products are inconvenient to purchase for consumers, so what do many brand owners do? Get desperate and turn to urgency/scarcity tactics start to sell more.
And that’s how competition battles start because other desperate companies are sharing the same space.
With these sleazy marketing tactics, retailers/stockists will not see a loyal target market. They can smell desperation a mile away, even more so than consumers.
And if they’re smelling it and are also marketed to in the same sleazy urgent way, they won’t be willing to take you on.
Retailers are also human and want to be treated as such. If the only connection is made with 1 or 2 emails and not via phone or in-person, they’ll probably ignore you like all the others who are trying to play in their sandbox.
I wrote about brand positioning and picking up the phone when contacting retailers.
I also provide a free checklist with several more tips to help you get into retail stores, so grab it now. But don’t worry, I’m not taking it off anytime soon, so, no pressure.
#4: Competition Becomes Fair
If smaller brands can get their ethical products on major store shelves using ethical marketing practices, they will be able to compete fairly with the larger brands, giving everyone a chance to thrive.
#5: Speed Increases in the Supply Chains
The conscious consumer is very picky and only buys from brands he trusts. Sleazy marketing tactics don’t work with him. No, no! He demands ethical marketing practices.
As the typical consumer becomes more conscious about the manipulation and in his own shopping habits, he’ll only want to support ethical brands and the larger brands will have to accommodate and when more and more brands get on the ethical bandwagon, the supply chains will become more efficient over time.
#6: Production Regulations Become Stricter
When Ethical Marketing becomes a topic of the government, sh*t happens!
I cursed and applauded the GDPR at the same time because although I’m bilingual and speak English and German, I do not speak Legal and had to hire 2 people to help me out. BUT, it’s all good: All in the name of Ethical Marketing.
If more governments create laws and regulations that encourage ethical marketing and protect our data, stricter laws in the way things are produced are not far behind. Real change will happen sooner.
It’s already happening, but way too slow to satisfy me. BUT, unfortunately, the governments have to be involved in order to spark real change.
Embrace the GDPR! If that means unplugging that plugin that keeps Europeans out, do it because we don’t need more sleaze in this world. All in the name of Ethical Marketing
So What’s it Gonna Be?
Just remember, the way you market will either attract or repel the right customer, so it’s your decision on how do you want to market and what kind of a customer you want to have.
Over the next few months, I’m going to break down 7 Ethical Marketing practices that you can implement in your marketing strategy right away. One by one and yes, I will provide examples, both good and bad so that you can get inspired.
And if you want to talk in depth about your own marketing, let’s talk. If you don’t really know me, I got my marketing degree in 1991. That’s a LONG time, so I kinda do know what the heck I’m doing. Here’s more about me.
And, on a side-note, I haven’t eaten mammal meat since 1992, fish since 2012 and dairy since 2016, so know that if there’s anyone qualified enough to market for animals, it’s me! Just ask anyone who knows me. I not only market for animals, I speak and write for them too.
SO, if you have or market for a business that has anything to do with animal welfare, know that you’re in really good hands and can learn how to master your marketing or receive concrete advice on your current marketing situation from a compassionate expert that wants nothing but to see you succeed so that the harm done to animals is decreased.
Want to master your marketing?
If you have any more tips or can predict what else will happen, please share them so that others can learn and we can start to see improvements sooner.
Rock On,
Photo credit: Priscilla Du Preez on Unsplash.
