On ethics and empathy in marketing

I love marketing. Especially content and product marketing, which are the two most essential disciplines on a marketing team. They are the source of all that’s true about your product, services, and expertise. They define the strategy, intent, and action that feed every other marketing discipline.

Without a doubt, you’ll find a hundred thousand different perspectives that champion other parts of marketing and that’s fine. I’m a little biased.

Part of the reason I’m such a fan of content and product marketing is the ideals of these roles within a marketing organization. They are strategic, data-driven, and customer-centric in carrying out their activities (or they should be). And the good practitioners aren’t swayed by trends, aren’t provocateurs, or the cause of offense toward people.

But it’s not easy to be a marketer these days. The competition for attention is intense. There’s a willingness to bend the rules, stretch boundaries, and f#$% any semblance of empathy.

We’re living and working in what I sincerely hope is going to be a time of change. We’re watching movement on issues that are long overdue to be addressed. There are differing views about the right path forward, which is understandable. There are many heated and passionate conversations happening.

The ugly sides of marketing today

As much as I love marketing, I’m very aware of the sometimes predatory nature of my chosen profession. Not all marketers or businesses do shady things to get ahead. In fact, most don’t. But we also don’t call out the problems enough.

Your data and marketing

Marketing has long been the place where creativity and innovation can lead to some sketchy, uncomfortable tactics in the name of acquiring customers. The reason Facebook is still around at no charge to users is the users’ data are Facebook’s product. And data is big business right now. You get tracked on just about every website you visit.

There are business intelligence and content tracking tools that give us information about where website visitors came from, the kinds of content they’re searching, how marketing content is received, and whether it’s resonating. But if you don’t know it’s happening, it just seems creepy. The ethics of these tools and how businesses use consumer data have been in discussion for a long time.

All this tracking is supposed to give you a better experience and point you to customized search results and more relevant offers and help us build better content for you. Marketers love it because they can use the data to reach customers at scale, but not everyone is mindful of the unintended consequences of such power. Fortunately, there are more and more privacy regulations coming that will force businesses and marketers to think twice about their use of data, whether they’re ready or not.

Marketing messages matter

I was dismayed recently when I saw praise for a gym advertisement that had fat-phobic, body-shaming messaging. (I’ve decided I don’t need to share it here to make the point.) In a discussion about this poster, many in the group thought it was funny, brilliant, provocative and if you were offended, you’re just not their target market.

It’s 100% true that offended readers aren’t in the target market. That’s also 100% by design. More on that soon.

But was it actually necessary? In general, gyms aren’t particularly welcoming environments for people who don’t meet a certain standard of attraction. This is well known.

But let’s talk about the fat-phobic, body-shaming message: Marketing isn’t brilliant or even good when it tears people down. It’s not genius when it perpetuates damaging stereotypes, beliefs, and societal expectations. It’s disappointing that this needs to be said, but here we are.

The messages we put out to attract the right people can be funny, brilliant, and provocative without intentionally offending a large percentage of the population. It shows a lack of creativity and general disrespect for others to take this low brow approach to messaging.

Not every marketing message has to be positive or avoid controversy - oh, that would be so boring! But we marketers need to do better and celebrate truly exceptional marketing work rather than praising hurtful words disguised as targeting.

Tell me lies, tell me sweet little lies

While we’re talking messaging, let’s talk about how some companies like to exaggerate or stretch the boundaries of the truth about what they offer. Whether it’s promising outcomes from a product that can’t be guaranteed, or misrepresenting expertise in a particular area.

The thing is, people know.

I’ve seen businesses that copy the competition’s content and offerings or find similar businesses in different locales to snag their ideas. These kinds of tactics are a lazy, inauthentic approach to marketing. It can also potentially land the business in legal trouble.

I’ve had conversations several times recently with people I know who were disillusioned by or frustrated with businesses that were misleading their customers. When a client or customer trusts you enough to make the investment in your product or service, it’s important to deliver on your promise.

Honesty really is the best policy. If your product doesn’t do it, don’t say it does. If you’re trying to expand your expertise, practice it before you claim it.

Marketing isn’t a shortcut to success

No matter how much some business leaders want marketing to be the magic bullet that propels them to achieve every goal in the list, marketing is a marathon, not a sprint.

The desire to find shortcuts often leads to delays in the outcomes you actually want because there wasn’t a plan in place to factor in the prospect’s experience in each step, that they’re kept engaged, and the whole process is tested to prevent a breakdown.

Instead, prioritize what’s most important to achieve your business goals and make the investment in time and resources to set it up in a way that’s not only good for your brand and reflects your values but scalable as well.

Marketing may not ever be a shortcut but it’s like the flywheel and as you build momentum, you will see the return on your investment faster with consistent, conscious, quality effort.