Ethical Blog |

Tasks numbered one to six to align with Week Four Portfolio Activity.

One

Petals by P – although providing the option to purchase physical items – is intended to promote Paris as an aspiring Floral Stylist and is heavily designed as a portfolio/blog type website. The heavy use of social media advertising is what ultimately drives users to her website and in turn, increases sales and commissions.

Instagram is clearly no longer intended for personal use. It has further developed into a global platform that allows brands to show off their products, humanise their content, employ new talent and inspire their audience. Instagram now lets you promote your personal brand in a friendly, transparent, and authentic manner without hard selling to your customers.

Given Petals by P is heavily driven by aesthetics, Instagram creates a primary advantage over other potential social platforms as it has a deeper focus on its visual presence. Instagram is the best platform for showcasing content if you run a business that benefits from the design of your offerings with a clearly visible outcome.

Petals by P in essence, will centre itself on producing content that takes followers behind the scenes, shows off recent styling projects, educates the audience on different design styles and floral species, fun ‘day in the life’ and working reels, and imagery that reflects Paris’ personal design style to attract likeminded consumers for future collaborations.

To help achieve this goal, the use of tools and platforms such as Canva, Photoshop, InDesign, Premiere Pro and Ads Manager will assist to remain consistent high quality with content.

Two

A form of intellectual property known as copyright is how creators are given the ability to control how their content is used, as it acts as a safeguard for the original expression of their ideas.

Copyright laws aim to protect individuals from others who lack the skills and/or time to produce content themselves. Fostering the creation of new content for the benefit of your social society within the copyright system, allows you to determine the conditions under which others can reuse your content, thereby providing an incentive for people to produce and invest in new ideas separate to that of which they are wishing to pursue.

When you develop a blog post, Facebook, or Instagram post intended for your website, you are creating material that is protected by Australian copyright laws and you, as the owner, have access to a number of exclusive rights. However, if you wish to use copyright protected work from other creators, you must understand that they too have these rights and work to obtain the owner’s permission if you can’t rely on a fair dealing exception.

Just because information is readily available online, it does not mean that you can use it or that it is freeware. You must consider how to best manage user-generated content and credit the original creator where possible. Using a direct quote? Name the spokesperson. Discussing an idea? Note where it originated. Resharing an image? Tag or link where you found it. There is a plethora of ways to credit a user’s content legally and respectfully and although may create more work for yourself in the moment, is beneficial in the long run as it further proves your authenticity and reliability when your audience is viewing your work.

For a more in-depth description of Australian copyright laws, click the link https://www.alrc.gov.au/publication/genes-and-ingenuity-gene-patenting-and-human-health-alrc-report-99/28-copyright-and-databases/copyright-law/

Three

There are a variety of legal issues that you must keep in mind when developing content for your business. Reoccurring issues include piracy, privacy, defamation, advertising laws and IP (intellectual property) laws. As a brand, personal or not, you must be wary while producing and sharing content as there is great potential for infringements regarding copyright, trademark, and other IP rights.

Piracy is the act of making unlawful copies of copyrighted music, software, movies, products, and digital content without authorisation. When producing content for Petals by P, our focus when considering piracy is to avoid the download of unregistered music within IG reels and other video content. Ensure all music is not copyrighted and the digital imagery is your own.

Defamation is an untrue or unsubstantiated statement that is said or written by one individual which negatively impacts and/or reflects the reputation of another person. Because Petal by P doesn’t necessarily need to depict content involving others defamation can easily be avoided. However, if there ever was a time when another person is being discussed, ensure content is true, transparent and is not written in a demeaning and discriminating nature.

Re advertising laws, adversary information must remain truthful and non-deceptive. It is important that any promotional posts created by Petals by P is evidence based and backs up all claims. For example, Paris obtained a Bachelor of Business from the Fashion Institute – depict her qualification on the website or in a post potentially via graduation imagery or her certificate. The more transparent you are with your audience, the more they will trust in your personal brand.

Four

Morale in the workplace is vital. Displaying good ethical behaviour has a positive effect on employee and client relationships. Employees are likely to continue to make accurate, fast-paced, and better decisions when positive business ethics are guiding workplace principle.

Business ethics are an essential skill. It is recommended to instil a business ethics program to help connect with your employees and remain on similar paths as you succeed in your overarching company goals. The first step in building this type of ethical culture is to develop your program. The program should include a complete guide of business functions touching on areas such as operations, human resources, and marketing. It should thoroughly describe what is expected, what is driving the purpose and how you will collectively reach those goals.

Business ethics are linked to customer loyalty. Over half of Australian consumers refuse to purchase from companies that are linked to unethical practices. In short, good ethics build profitability.

Five

Petals by P collects user information anytime an individual signs-up or contacts the business via email or the attached contact page. Although this is legal, there are still many privacy regulations to follow and consider.

You should only ever collet private information after you have notified individuals you will be doing so. You must also give them the option to opt out if they do not wish would continue further. Once, if granted permission, you have collected information, it must be stored discreetly and securely. You must not share private information and if you feel the need to, request approval.

For any collaborations or commissions completed by Petals by P, it is important to discuss the repost, reshare, discussion and distribution of content that may have been shot at a private location, e.g., a wedding.

For a more in-depth description of Australian privacy laws, click the link https://www.ipc.nsw.gov.au/fact-sheet-understanding-your-privacy-obligations

Six

Spam is recognised as any form of unwanted digital communications that is sent in bulk. Often the enclosed information is received via SMS, phone calls or email, and much of the time, the information is false.

Spam and privacy are quite closely linked. If, for example, you wish to not sign up for newsletter updates when providing your email details for an online purchase and begin to receive various emails from the company, it can be considered as spam.

For Petals by P to monitor spam, regularly visiting, analysing, and updating your customers subscribe/unsubscribe lists is essential. If a customer subscribes, send them our weekly emails informing them of new blog posts, social posts, commissions, and potential new products. If they then wish to unsubscribe, remove them from your mailing list BEFORE the release of your next email campaign.

There are several online monitoring tools such as Klaviyo that can assist with this consistent regulation as well as companies such as Lion Digital who can be contracted to help with email campaigns and flows.

Visit Lion Digital via the link https://liondigital.com.au