Summary:
Read Deceitful Spammer or Marketing Genius? and completethe questions at the end of the case study.
Jessica Silliman
Rachel Bailey was quickly hired out of Santa Clara Universityduring the dot-com boom to a company of 100 employees that ran aninnovative social networking website in Silicon Valley. She wasimmediately put in charge of email communication to customers-bothexisting and potential.
The Internet was quite new to everyone and online communication(via email) had little corporate regulation or set social protocol.Privacy policies were yet to be established. With thousands ofindividuals discovering the Internet everyday, business was boomingfor the small Silicon Valley firm.
Rachel handled all online contact with existing users and wasasked to market to these existing online community members viaemail. But she struggled with finding a balance of the right amountof marketing. With Internet competition growing everyday within thesocial networking websites, these users had plenty of alternatives.And flooding their email inboxes, she thought, wasn't the best wayto attract them.
Unfortunately, Rachel's boss had a different approach. The VicePresident of Marketing wanted results-he wanted existing customersto upgrade their networking packages and follow through onadvertisements. He told Rachel to be as aggressive as possible withher email campaigns. But at the same time, Rachel spoke withcoworkers who didn't want to work for a company known for its emailspam. They prided themselves on working at an organization thatrespected its users and didn't abuse the ease of emailcommunication-even within the competitive market.
Rachel found subtle alternatives to the mass emails. Shedeveloped links on the company website to advertisements, but shewasn' t getting the results her boss demanded.
One day when Rachel arrived at the office, her boss said he hada brilliant idea. He said that everybody knew someone named CindyAnderson, so they could send emails to their users from that nameto trick them into opening the email, which would display a link totheir website.
Rachel was incensed with her boss's idea. "A lot of people arevery casual with the truth," she said.
Rachel felt very uncomfortable with the thought of implementingwhat she considered to be her boss's deceptive idea.
"People trust you with their email addresses," said Rachel. "Youhave to be responsible and not take advantage of that access."
She worried that existing customers would begin to resent thecompany and unsubscribe. But she also had a commitment to drawingin as many new customers as she could-and her more subtle tacticsweren't working.
Rachel made the decision to stand up to her boss. The followingweek she told him that his idea was deceitful and would causecustomers to lose trust and faith in the company. In the end, itwouldn't be a financially viable solution to their problem.
Rachel proved to be convincing. Her boss took her advice andbegan to realize that it was a bad idea.
"In the end, we had happy customers and our company gained morevalue in the highly competitive market," said Rachel.
Discussion Questions: NO PLAGIARISMPLEASE
- Describe the ethical dilemma or dilemmas Rachel faced.
- Do you think Rachel's boss' "Cindy Anderson" strategy isethically acceptable? Why or why not?
- What is Rachel's obligation to her customers and what areRachel 's obligations to the company?
- What do you think is the most important factor in how Rachelresponded to the situation: That she thought the proposed "CindyAnderson" strategy was deceitful or that she thought the strategywould cost the company customers?
Jessica Silliman was a 2006-07 Hackworth Fellow at TheMarkkula Center for Applied Ethics.
June 2007
