We are dumb. We don't know any facts. Do We?
One telecom company is saying "We are the
fastest", one cosmetic brand is saying "using this will reverse your
aging", the story of these kinds of false claims doesn't stop here.
Television is full of these kind of imprecise advertisements. While coming into
this business field, the foremost thing we are being told is
"PROFIT", but was that at the cost of someone's health, never.
Now-a-days companies are doing these distasteful actions, and we have a whole
list of that-
These are just some among the heap. We are seeing famous
bollywood celebrities doing the ads of hair oil (basically mineral oil) and
saying that’s the secret of their black, thick, long and shiny hair. We again
see the same celeb doing the advertisement of some hair coloring stuff, what
are they trying to do , how could they convince us , on one side they are
saying that they have lustourous hair because they use that particular oil and
now they are saying us to buy hair color, sorry celebs but I’m completely
handicapped in finding out your logic behind this.
Beauty Care brand “Lotus Herbals” has it’s one product named
YOUTHRx which contains “Gineplex Youth
Compound” , it can reverse your aging 10% in just 4 weeks, ad of this is done
by bollywood celeb Shilpa Shetty Kundra. So, is this ethical to claim that a
person is going to get back his/her youth skin back? Same happened with “Dabur
Chyawanprash”, it’s ad claimed that it gave children 3x more immunity and power
to fight diseases. It was slammed by ASCI for making claims that are unsubstantiated.
Health drink brand named ‘Horlicks’ which claims to make children taller,
stronger and sharper. A complaint was filed against the brand for one of it’s
ads saying that it improves concentration and can help students to score better
in exams. The complaint stated that the drink has nothing by which they can
prove their statement. The company is basically using people’s apprehensions by
targeting the exam season.
What Is Ethical Advertising?
The U.S. Federal Trade Commission defines ethical advertising as
truthful, not deceptive, is backed by evidence, and fair. The FTC requires that
advertisers follow those four requirements, so that they can state that they
promote truth in advertising. The concept of a “reasonable consumer” is used
when determining the perspective from which the FTC decides whether an
advertisement fulfills these requirements or not..
Unethical
advertising typically isn’t considered a crime and is more of a moral issue
than a legal one. However, there are situations where the advertisement goes to
the extreme. In this case, the advertisement willfully deceives the audience
into buying the product being advertised. In such cases, the state or federal
consumer protection departments could potentially prosecute the advertiser.
Many states have a law that allows consumers to file complaints leveled against
businesses that advertise their products using unethical advertisements. The
U.S. Federal Trade Commission takes of consumer complaints at the federal
level. Harsh penalties are assigned to advertisers who are found guilty of
unethical advertising practices.
In a
nutshell, don’t toe the line and play on
the edge. You might make the public very angry, which will affect your bottom
line. On the other hand, you might be risking prosecution, and you might end up
paying harsh penalties to the government. Instead, strive to promote the truth
in your advertising. Of course, there’s nothing wrong with trying to emphasize
the strengths of your service or product. However, whatever you do, do not lie.
If you’re going to make a claim about your product or service, make sure you
can back up your claim with irrefutable evidence. Also, you should not leave
out any vital information that's relevant to why the consumer should consider
about buying the product. Leaving out necessary information is committing a lie
by omission
(Source:-https://smallbusiness.chron.com/difference-between-unethical-ethical-advertising-19262.html
)
