It’s super pervasive to consider ‘growth hacking’ as synonymous with marketing.
However, I care to disagree – and I would go so far as to say that the ‘growth hacking’ approach that results in speedy growth, more often than not, is probably not an ethical marketing approach.
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Growth hacking is unethical.
Hi I’m DJ from Rainbow Dragon Digital and in today I’m going to discuss why I think that the idea around “growth hacking” – which is super pervasive in marketing at the moment – is, controversially, quite unethical.
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Fast Growth Quickly Becomes Unethical
Today I want to talk about something that might be a little bit controversial with a bunch of marketers but I’m feeling more reaffirmed by having met more marketers that actually are operating in this same way that I’m about to talk about.
I just did a workshop, actually, about what is ethical marketing and it’s a very slippery area, it’s difficult to pin down. But I think one of the things that is quite important to me is that fast growth quite quickly and easily becomes unethical.
Why Is Growth Hacking Unethical?
Almost every time there is quick, fast immediate growth some sort of unethical thing is happening.
That might be because you’re stepping on your employees, or it might mean that you’re stepping on your customers, or it might mean that you’re taking advantage of systemic oppression. But there’s some way that fast growth will be almost always be unethical.
Balancing the Doughnut of Ethics
And in the end, you do have to weigh that up against your balance of ethics. I talk about a “Doughnut of Ethics” similar to Kate Raworth’s Doughnut Economics – I used her model to think about marketing ethics and how there is a tension between the individual and society when we talk about ethics, and that there are a bunch of rather individual metrics that you need to use to measure where on that Doughnut you are.
And when there’s speedy growth it usually means that one of those metrics is out of whack.
So What is More Ethical Than Growth Hacking?
Now, what do you do instead? I attended another workshop from another marketer at Newton Bell, and their marketing agency is built around slow, steady growth. And that is what is going to help you maintain your Doughnut of Ethics.
Make sure that you market in the right way and grow in the right way.
This doesn’t mean no growth – it means growing within the bounds of ethics and within the bounds of our society. And not taking advantage of people.
This means improving your message and improving your user experience. Make sure that your product is actually adding value to people. Make sure the way you’re communicating is not deceptive and is accurately portraying what you’re doing and the value that you are bringing to people.
As soon as you start communicating in a way that’s trying to highlight certain things and hide other things, you’re starting to deceive and you’re starting to become unethical.
I realise that the conversation of ethics is always a little bit controversial so I would seriously hugely welcome anyone to make comments on this. I am open to being wrong ethics is a slippery thing and it and it is a thing that I believe everyone should be open to being wrong about. So please comment below if you have any about this particular topic.
You can also join my Facebook group Marketing for the Many – I’m responding to stuff on there as they come in. I’m also posting interesting insights I find there!
Otherwise please enjoy the other videos on my channel and I’ll see you in another one.