Our Commitment to Ethical Marketing

What is Ethical Marketing?

Ethical marketing is the practice of promoting businesses, products, and services that provide value to the end user, that do not harm, and that are kind to the environment. We do this by ensuring that we adhere to the highest ethical standards possible; to avoid manipulative or deceptive marketing tactics, by being careful about which clients we work with, and by taking all stakeholders into account when performing this work.

 

Our Core Values

While the values that we live and work by are complex and nuanced, we have chosen these core values to represent our company and our methods:

  • Growth – Giving underrepresented and marginalized groups a chance to flourish, in terms of both economic and social power.

 

  • Authenticity – Staying true to our mission of supporting non-profits and mission-driven businesses, as well as underrepresented and marginalized groups, maintaining our integrity, and being transparent about the way we do business.

 

  • Impact – Having a positive impact on communities, the environment, and the world.

 

  • Nurturing – Caring for and nourishing our planet, our people, and each other.

 

  • Sustainability – Supporting businesses that help us to coexist in our global world.
Ethical Gains' core values

AMA Ethical Standards

We promise to adhere to the American Marketing Association’s Code of Conduct regarding ethics in marketing. These standards are covered in brief below, but you can read more about this code of conduct at the AMA website.

  • Honesty – to be forthright in dealings with customers and stakeholders.
  • Responsibility – to accept the consequences of our marketing decisions and strategies.
  • Fairness – to balance justly the needs of the buyer with the interests of the seller.
  • Respect – to acknowledge the basic human dignity of all stakeholders.
  • Transparency – to create a spirit of openness in marketing operations.
  • Citizenship – to fulfill the economic, legal, philanthropic, and societal responsibilities that serve stakeholders.

Excellence in Ethics

Our goal is not just to meet the ethical standards of our industry, but to exceed them. In order to do work that we can take pride in, we must demonstrate excellence in our ethical standards. We refuse to be held to the most basic standard in ethics. To that end, we will:

  • Honesty – Not just be honest, but be radically honest. Avoid manipulative marketing tactics. Communicate with clarity and transparency.
  • Responsibility – Serve the needs of both our clients and their customers. Support non-profit organizations and mission driven businesses. Support the small businesses that are the lifeblood of our communities. Continue to pursue environmentally responsible business practices, including participation in 1% For The Planet.
  • Fairness – Being transparent about pricing, manufacturing processes, and supply chain practices. Only partnering with clients who are willing to engage in this level of transparency. Avoiding competitive conflicts, any kind of price fixing behavior, and undermining small local businesses. Maintaining high privacy standards for both clients and their customers.
  • Respect – Pushing back against racist tropes and stereotypes. Avoiding harm to any demographic groups in the content that we produce. Fostering inclusivity and equity. Being transparent about the work we produce; giving our content authors bylines and being clear about third party vendors that we partner with.
  • Transparency – Communicating with all stakeholder groups with radical transparency. Accepting constructive criticism and incorporating that criticism into our business practices. Taking responsibility for when we mess up. Being willing to discontinue partnerships with clients that present an unsolvable ethical conflict.
  • Citizenship – Requiring that all of our clients have a social or environmental give back program by 2023. Being transparent in all content we produce about marketing practices. Celebrating clients, supply chain partners, and competitors who are engaging in good citizenship practices. Supporting our clients in navigating sensitive topics.

Our Commitments to Stakeholders

Without our stakeholders, there would be no Ethical Gains. The most important part of our ethics commitment is our commitment to the individual stakeholder groups that support us. To this end, we make the following commitments to these groups:

  • Clients – We will always do our best to help you succeed. We will be transparent in our business practices and pricing. We will deal with you fairly and honestly. We will maintain the highest possible level of privacy standards when dealing with your information.

 

  • Customers – We will not market products or services that are not what they seem. We will not make claims that these products or services cannot fulfill. We will never help to sell items that we know will harm you. We will not work with clients that do not engage with you fairly.

 

  • Community – We will support communities of all backgrounds and identities, both economically and practically. We will not harm the environment in which you live. We will not knowingly undermine the businesses that make your community vital and unique.

 

  • Our Environment – We will not knowingly engage in business practices that harm the environment. We will not knowingly partner with clients that engage in business practices that cause harm to the environment without offsets. We will continue contributions to environmental organizations.

 

  • Supply Chain Partners – We will deal with you fairly and honestly. We will give credit where credit is due. We will treat our relationship as a true partnership, rather than a simple economic exchange.

 

  • Competitors – We believe that the digital marketing ecosystem is one in which we can all succeed. We will not engage in marketing practices that intentionally harm our competitors. We will cooperate with other organizations in the digital marketing space whenever possible.

 

  • Employees – We will deal with you fairly, in terms of working environment, pay, and interpersonal dealings. We will address you with respect. We will foster a working environment that harms neither your mental nor physical health. We will not work with clients that knowingly create harmful or dangerous working environments, or that deal with their employees unfairly.

We have an obligation to the people and communities that help us do what we do, and we want to ensure that we not only meet that obligation, but exceed it. This allows us to truly give back to the people that make Ethical Gains possible. If you have questions or comments about this commitment or about ethical marketing in general, contact us here and we’ll get back to you as quickly as we can.

Thank you to all of our stakeholders for making this possible. We love the work we do and are honored to have the opportunity to serve you.

Services

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Contact Info

2000 Franklin St #102
Bellingham, WA 98225

[email protected]

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Digital marketing for good

We’re an ethical SEO agency who services nonprofits and mission-driven businesses.

We specialize in making the best-performing Shopify websites with a focus on searchability and driving sales.

We create quality, engaging content that speaks directly to your audience.

We stand with Black Lives Matter and those marginalized and abused by systemic racism. 

“In a racist society, it is not enough to be non-racist, we must be anti-racist.” -Angela Davis

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