The selected UK – based brand
Social media is a vast field where brands can have lots of opportunities for marketing (Cheung and To 2021). This paper aims to choose by brand which must be based on the United Kingdom so that the paper can discuss the ethical considerations the brand may face while making the social media marketing efforts. The selected brand for this paper is Tesco. Thus, this paper will first discuss the ethical considerations in case of social media marketing. Then the paper will discuss the ethical considerations for Tesco while it makes the social media marketing efforts. It is a critical fact that while brand find many opportunities for their marketing in the social media landscape, it also faces some ethical questions as well regarding how they conduct themselves in the social media marketing field (Chilwane 2021). Therefore, the chosen lead brand has to consider how social media platform reflects its brand values as well as its ethics. But sometimes, it happens that ethical consideration also intersects with the limits which are proposed by the law (Cheung and To 2021). In this paper, the analysis will be supported with the help of academic research as well as evidence which are available on the public platform of the chosen brand. The referencing will be used in such a way that it can support the analysis in its way.
The selected UK – based brand is Tesco which is considered as one of the leading brands in the country. In the UK, there are a range of stores of this company starting from small basic level retailing shop to huge staged super markets (Tesco Plc 2021). In the UK, 86 percent of the total international sales of this brand is from the UK markets (Peeroo 2019). Research states that the strength of Tesco in the UK is that it has been successful to capture the advertise of the super markets of the UK (Alsaud 2021). That is why, Tesco is termed as a big influence in the division of super market of the United Kingdom (Krummel 2022). As history states that the retailer store of Tesco has ben established by Jack Cohen in 1919 (Sun et al. 2021). The first store of this brand has been opened in 1929 by which the Tesco Stores Limited has been incorporated in the year 1932 (Aiello et al. 2020). Though, it is considered as one of the biggest retailer company in the UK, still it has some ethical issues that need consideration by the business authority of Tesco.
Ethical issues are the ethical beliefs regarding the accurate as well as incorrect belongings of an establishment (Chilwane 2021). This aim is generally guarded by the organisations such as a private business o a social service sector (Cheung and To 2021). In this case, the ethical considerations are tackled by the company itself (Cheung and To 2021). The performance in the field of the ethics is considered as respectable when it is correct (Cheung and To 2021). Ethical morals of a company include the practice plus the behaviours inside the company itself (Cheung and To 2021). In these cases, the business managers of the companies usually generate decisions which are designed in such a way that it can accomplish the assigned aims and objectives regarding the ethical considerations (Cheung and To 2021). The decisions which are made by the manager of the company are usually related to the employees of the company (Cheung and To 2021).
Ethical considerations in social media marketing
For the last few years, Tesco has developed the internet site of its to a substantial degree (Aiello et al. 2020). It provides the chance of buying goods from a normal retailer shop (Aiello et al. 2020). Also, it provides services such as car insurance as well as furniture (Aiello et al. 2020). This is considered as a compliment for the strategy of expanding the company to non – food sector (Sun et al. 2021). In online space, Tesco completes more than 500,000 transaction in a week which is near about 2 billion pound in total per year (Sun et al. 2021). Therefore, from these data, it can be stated that the social media marketing policy is quite successful for Tesco as its profitability plus its size along with the number of transactions it does make this brand a unique online grocery store (Sun et al. 2021).
Social media marketing now – a – days is continuous inviting the conservations regarding the social media marketing ethics (Ebrahim 2020). It has been come in action since the inception (Stoychev 2020). This results in continuous adjustments of the marketing strategies as well as tactics in the social media platforms (Wibowo et al. 2020). Further, it is needed to be mentioned that digital marketing is not resistant to unsavoury practices (Pan, Torres and Zúñiga 2019). Therefore, the ethical consideration in the social media marketing challenge both the consumers as well as the marketers as the social media platforms is continuously growing (Soegoto and Utomo 2019). The ethical considerations in the social media marketing can determine how consumers show the business (Li, Larimo and Leonidou 2021). There are ethical issues such as data privacy, transparency, bias which are significant for the company to consider while it starts to crafting its social media marketing campaigns (Pan, Torres and Zúñiga 2019).
On the other hand, if the ethics of a business needs to be discussed, primarily it must be mentioned that business ethical considerations are the foundation based on which various companies develop their reputation (Soegoto and Utomo 2019). Ethical consideration of a company build trust between the consumer and the company itself (Li, Larimo and Leonidou 2021). If the company is transparent regarding its ethical practices, then its consumers will be noticed (Pan, Torres and Zúñiga 2019). It is as simple as that. In general, ethics can be defined as the set of moral principles along with a shared concept of what is right and what is wrong (Soegoto and Utomo 2019). On the other hand, ethical considerations in case of social media marketing are not that rigid set of essentials that companies must follow (Li, Larimo and Leonidou 2021). Instead of this, ethical considerations in case of social media marketing can be considered as an unwritten code of conduct (Pan, Torres and Zúñiga 2019).
If a company deceives consumers from achieving financial gain, it is considered as ethically wrong and when a company becomes successful in establishing trust via honest interactions, it is considered as an ethical gain which leads to financial gain of the company as well (Li, Larimo and Leonidou 2021). Therefore, it can be stated that it is crucial specially in the present time of social accountability that a company must practice admirable marketing ethics (Pan, Torres and Zúñiga 2019). Though marketing ethics are easy and simple to understand, on the other hand, ethics on social media marketing is a wider as well as immediate impactful (Li, Larimo and Leonidou 2021). Tips for ethical social media marketing ae as follows: 1) being honest, 2) being transparent, 3) no compromise on data, and 4) no exploitation of emotion (Pan, Torres and Zúñiga 2019). Therefore, it can be stated that customers connect well with the business practices when the company practices ethical social medial marketing as there are no down falls of practicing ethical social media marketing (Li, Larimo and Leonidou 2021).
Ethical considerations of Tesco in its social media marketing
Social media is considered as a battle ground for retailing companies such as Tesco (Hashim et al. 2021). This brand uses social listening gauge to know what its consumers want and also to tailor the offers of the brand accordingly (Tse et al. 2018). Print as well as social media advertising are used extensively by this brand as a tested channel through which the company can send promotional as well as important messages to the current and potential customers of the company (Hashim et al. 2021). Research states that this company mostly depends on promotional offers so that it can attract as well as retain consumers as the company provides buy one, get one offers on a regular basis on their online stores as well (Tse et al. 2018).
As mentioned above, there can be several ethical issues in the social media marketing such as data privacy, transparency and biasness (Pan, Torres and Zúñiga 2019). These issues are required to be crafted when a company starts its campaigns for social media marketing (Li, Larimo and Leonidou 2021). It is required for the company or the brand that they state the truth abut themselves and their products as well on the social medial platform so that the customers do not feel cheated (Pan, Torres and Zúñiga 2019). Honestly is provided to extend the business personality along with the ways the brand communicates with its consumers (Li, Larimo and Leonidou 2021). On the other hand, transparency is another crucial element in the social media marketing which reduces the ethical issues made by a company (Pan, Torres and Zúñiga 2019). On social media, it is pretty easy to find the affiliations based on environment, politics and business (Li, Larimo and Leonidou 2021). Consumers can judge the brand pretty quickly based in these affiliations. Therefore, it is required for the brand to be transparent regarding its affiliations with other entities (Pan, Torres and Zúñiga 2019).
It is believed that swaying emotions for motivating actions is considered as the ultimate art of marketing (Li, Larimo and Leonidou 2021). But there is a difference line between appealing emotion and exploiting them which can generate serious ethical issues in the marketing field (Pan, Torres and Zúñiga 2019). From the above discussion, it can be considered that ethical considerations in the social media marketing is a nuanced subject which is not completely resolved though the above – mentioned tips (Li, Larimo and Leonidou 2021). But these are the good spaces for starting when a brand starts to consider its social media marketing campaigns (Pan, Torres and Zúñiga 2019). In the context of Tesco, ethical issues that this company needs to consider are climate change, environmental reporting, palm oil, resources as well as habitats, toxics plus pollutions, human rights, irresponsible marketing, rights of the workers, animals reports, , using controversial technologies, factory farming, political activities, along with anti – social finance (Li, Larimo and Leonidou 2021). Tesco needs to be transparent about these issues while approaching social media marketing strategy (Pan, Torres and Zúñiga 2019). It needs to also being honest while approaching marketing strategies in social media so that its consumers can trust the brand and a string dependent relationship can build between the brand and its consumers (Li, Larimo and Leonidou 2021).
Conclusion
From the above discussion, it can be concluded that ethics are one of ways by which consumers and the brand can develop a trustworthy relationship between them. the meaning of the ethical consideration in the filed of social media marketing have been discussed in details. The brand that has been selected for this paper is the Tesco whose background information has been presented in the paper as well. The marketing strategy along with the current state of the marketing of this brand have been mentioned in this paper. Then the paper has mentioned what it means by ethics. The ethical considerations along with its significance in the marketing strategy especially in the social media marketing strategy have been explained in this paper as well. Like all other companies, Tesco also has some ethical issues that it needs to consider while approaching marketing strategies on the social media platform. These issues have been highlighted in this paper. Apart from that, the tips to be ethically sound and proper by the companies have also been mentioned in the paper as well. For Tesco, what are the ethical concerns that the company needs to consider while approaching online marketing strategy have been mentioned in this paper. Also, the ethical issues in the Tesco’s working policy have been mentioned.
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