Reflective Video Journal

Reflective video journal

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Introduction

Over the last decade, marketing has drastically evolved and it is an essential part of business. Marketing is designed to spearhead a business to growth and therefore, marketing plan is fundamental to any business organization. It connects a business with customers, competitors and other stakeholders and therefore, every organization needs effective marketing strategies. However, for marketing to achieve its core goals and objectives there is a need for firms carrying out marketing to work efficient and responsibly without violating both social and environmental responsibilities applied in marketing practices. This paper therefore, presents critical analysis of various environmental and social responsibilities, which are involve in marketing.

Marketing is continued to be viewed management function developed to satisfy exchange. The marketing managers’ primary task is to efficiently manage marketing mix (4 Ps) by seeking the meet the needs of the market and achieve firm profitability goal through exchange. According to Marin (2017), marketing is derived as an organizational responsibility which is not only involves the work of a specific area. The primary work of marketing is to create value for the market. And therefore, the essential for maintaining the relationship with all stakeholders must be recognized and applied. It must be able to create a clear relationship between the business world and the society. Marketing should be able to create impact to the society. The activities of marketing are required to provide benefit to the society as whole.

Marketing should not be about profit alone, it is required to involve social responsibilities as well. Siham (2014) pointed that philanthropy is a central factor in maintaining competitive advantage in the market. Therefore, CRS is an important aspect in business performance which should form central part of marketing strategies. A study indicates that firms, which have integrated their business potation with CRS have benefited from direct relationship with society CITATION Har15 \l 1033 (Reddy, 2015).

Marketing is considered to be educational, science and philosophy than just a management system. Siham ( 2014) stated that social responsible marketing was derived as a response to previous questionable marketing practices, which have seriously affected the society. The main criticism of marketing is received from the mainstream marketing strategies, which cause high prices. The marketing strategy does not consider the interest of the people and therefore, it increases the prices of commodities. As stated by Siham (2014), the mainstream marketing strategies main goal is to drive profit and there is no concern about the society. The profit driven marketing has been derived and therefore, it is not an appropriate strategy. It is better to consider customers when pricing product to ensure that the social issues affecting customer are captured. However, contemporary marketing depends heavily on aggressive promotion and advertisement. Therefore, in order to lower the cost, firms charge higher prices and therefore, this affects the people and the society.

But social responsible marketing strategies reject the deceptive marketing strategies which are applied in pricing, packaging, pricing even when they are done legally. The marketing exert a huge economic implication in the society. The current marketing strategies to have the interest of people and the society, and therefore, the pricing of products should be done based on the market needs and the market cash flow to avoid exploitation of customers which is unethical CITATION Par15 \l 1033 (Parıltı, Demirgüneş, & Ozsacmaci, 2015). Though there are some organizations regarding as business, it is unethical to take advantage of customers for the sake of profit. The mainstream marketing strategy is one of the unethical marketing, which has been rejected by many companies due to less contribution to social welfare of the society. Some advocates for socially responsible marketing have made an argument that some current marketing, which is being practiced, encourages people to buy even what they actually do not need. It also place constant desire to have a lot of materials, which leads to excessive spending. According to Parıltı, Demirgüneş, and Ozsacmaci, (2015), this type of marketing is not socially responsible and create problem in the society. Therefore, they are some of the unethical marketing practices, which should be rejected. The obsession with a lot of material goods after some times can cause serious damages to the society. However, the socially responsible marketing pays attention to the social cost, which is included in the marketing. It is important to ensure that corporate profits does not negatively affect the society and therefore, corporations should have appropriate way of pricing, marketing and managing the general operation of a company, which are inclined to the social and environmental solutions CITATION Par15 \l 1033 (Parıltı, Demirgüneş, & Ozsacmaci, 2015). It is therefore, important to have marketing strategies or system which contributes to environmental and social sustainability of the society at the same time producing profits for business.

However, other unethical marketing issues are related to attitude and feelings against a specific people in the society. Marketing strategies should be neutral and not being seen as offensive. But companies have failed to comply with such practice CITATION Sio17 \l 1033 (Siomkos & Rouvaki, 2017). The unethical marketing can be related to views related to other ethnical community which can cause a company to lose its market share. The message and tine being conveyed must reflect the position of a company and therefore, it is always advisable to ensure that the message used in marketing especially in promotion, advertisement is not offensive.

The CRS has been integrated at different level of organizational operations with marketing to ensure that organization work together with the society. A study indicates that most companies contribute to the growth of the society through partnership to donate a huge fund for the growth of the society. For instance, Coca Cola has effective CRS strategy, which has helped the company to create a huge impact and endure customers to the product CITATION Kum17 \l 1033 (Kumar & Mokhtar, 2017). It has been noted that Coca Cola sponsors several sporting activities, which connect it directly to customers. Though the company has sponsor several problems, which builds talents. Marketing strategies should be incorporated with other activities which can uplift the living standard of people. And therefore, companies like Coca Cola enjoy the massive share market due to its practical marketing practice.

It is therefore, recommended to have an elaborate marketing strategy, which can produce good result to the company and also uplift the living standard of the people. The acceptable marketing strategies should consider social and environmental aspect of the society. The interest of the people should be considered when pricing products, advertising, and promotion of products. It would also be practical to consider political, environmental, economical and social issues, which affect people when deriving and the best marketing strategy which can be used by company.

References

BIBLIOGRAPHY Kumar, P., & Mokhtar, M. S. (2017). Ethical marketing practices viewed through consumer spectacles. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/316278535_Ethical_marketing_practices_viewed_through_consumer_spectacles , 2-15.

Marin L., L. (2017). Marketing and Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). Moving between broadening the concept of marketing and social factors as a marketing strategy. Spanish Journal of Marketing , 2 (21), 2-15.

Parıltı, N., Demirgüneş, K. B., & Ozsacmaci, B. (2015). ETHICAL ISSUES IN MARKETING: AN APPLICATION FOR UNDERSTANDING ETHICAL DECISION MAKING. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/276868251_ETHICAL_ISSUES_IN_MARKETING_AN_APPLICATION_FOR_UNDERSTANDING_ETHICAL_DECISION_MAKING , 12-35.

Reddy, H. (2015). Ethical Challenges in Marketing. IOSR Journal of Business and Management (IOSR-JBM) , 28-35.

Siham, B. (2014). MARKETING MIX- AN AREA OF UNETHICAL PRACTICES? British Journal of Marketing Studies , 2-14.

Siomkos, G., & Rouvaki, C. (2017). The Ethical and Unethical Dimensions of Marketing. Management Review: An International Journal , 2-15.