The Ethics of Online Marketing to Kids

• Posted: Friday, September 08, 2006
• |
• Author: pradhana

Just because you can, it does not mean you should.

By Ben Macklin - Senior Analyst

Everybody in society, whether they are marketers or consumers, lives by certain rules. These rules can be either legal rules written down and enacted into law, or unwritten rules by which people make choices about what is right and wrong or good and bad for them and for the society they live in. The tricky thing about a society founded on rules is when two seemingly equally important rules clash. When this happens in a legal sense, the ultimate arbiter of what is right and wrong is the court system; but when it moves into the ethical realm, the ultimate arbiter is either your own personal conscience or the collective conscience of the group, organization or society in which you belong.

In the context of marketing to children, there are certain legal rules with which marketers must comply, such as the Children's Online Protection Act, as well as certain ethical standards to which marketers are encouraged to aspire.

In 2004, The American Marketing Association (AMA) adopted (or at least published) a code of ethics for marketers. Its three general norms (those principles by which a marketer's standard of conduct should be measured) are as follows:

1. Marketers must do no harm
2. Marketers must foster trust in the marketing system
3. Marketers must embrace, communicate and practice the fundamental ethical values that will improve consumer confidence in the integrity of the marketing exchange system; these basic values are intentionally aspirational and include honesty, responsibility, fairness, respect, openness and citizenship.

• Permalink
• RSS 2.0
• 
• 
• 
• 
•