Marketing ethics and social responsibility
• have grown in importance over the last few years because many firms have seen their image, reputation, and marketing efforts destroyed by problems in these areas.
• have become necessities in light of stakeholder demands and changes in federal law.
• improve marketing performance and profits.
• are important considerations in the development of marketing strategy.

Social responsibility
• is a broad concept that relates to an organization’s obligation to maximize its positive impact on society while minimizing its negative impact.
• includes the economic responsibility of making a profit to serve shareholders, employees, and the community at large.
• includes the legal responsibility of obeying all laws and regulations.
• includes the ethical responsibility to uphold principles and standards that define acceptable conduct as determined by the public, government regulators, private-interest groups, competitors, and the firm itself.
• includes the philanthropic responsibility to increase the firm’s overall positive impact on society, the local community, and the environment.

Marketing ethics
• contains the principles and standards that guide the behavior of individuals and groups in making marketing decisions.
• requires that both organizations and individuals accept responsibility for their actions and comply with established value systems.
• can lead to violations of public trust when ethical standards are not upheld.
• involves complex and detailed decisions in which correctness may not be so clear cut.
• deals with experiences and decisions made at work, which may be quite different from the ethical decisions made away from work.
• comes into play any time that an activity causes managers, employees, or customers in a target market to feel manipulated or cheated.

Deceptive practices