New emotions matter - Phrasee · 2020. 9. 29. · business-as-usual through new methods of...
Transcript of New emotions matter - Phrasee · 2020. 9. 29. · business-as-usual through new methods of...
emotionsmatter.
32
THE
PHRASEE
PHILOSOPHY
An open letter from the Phrasee phounders
We launched the Emotions Matter
campaign to do the right thing.
For years, marketers have been
encouraged to use spurious tactics
to get people to buy more stuff. Too
often we’ve heard it said that people
buy because of fear or greed, so to
get them to buy more stuff from you,
you need to make them feel scared
or greedy.
As our lives are so inherently online
now and we’re marketed to online
all the time, the words, phrases,
images and tactics that marketers
use have a real effect on consumers.
If these messages are making people
feel afraid and anxious or inspiring
greed, this has a real impact on
mental health.
We think it’s high time that marketers
take responsibility for their actions
and realise there is more to what
they do than just selling a few
more widgets. All of us involved in
marketing bear a responsibility to
people, to treat them like actual
humans and move away from
using fear and anxiety to sell
more products.
At Phrasee, it’s very important to us
as a team that we remove some of
the stigma around mental health
and that marketers do not exploit it.
Marketing is about getting your
message out to market and about
shifting product, but you can do this
in a positive way by talking about
the good things and the positive
things you bring to market. We want
to encourage people to move away
from cynical fear tactics and move
towards positive tactics.
A good example is how Phrasee
markets itself – we could be like
those who say if you don’t do this,
you could be in big trouble or really
missing out, but instead, we take a
positive approach and encourage
people to look at the positivity they
can bring into the world.
We need to do something to
actively prevent the problems from
happening in the first place, to
expediate the solution instead of
exacerbating the problem. As part of
this campaign, we have published
our Phrasee ethics policy. There
are not too many companies out
there outwardly sharing their ethics
policies and we’d like to be a leader
in this field, sharing our promises and
standing by them. We will clearly
state that we will not use technology
to explicitly exploit vulnerable groups.
Parry, Neil & Vic
contents
The Phrasee Philosophy
A starter guide to ethical marketing
AI will transform marketing
Stand against fear & anxiety
Market differently
Learn from the key players
Spotlight sessions
Word up from senior marketers
Technology’s role in mental health
AI ethics policy | Why everyone should have one
AI ethics policy | …and here’s ours
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STARTERGUIDE TOETHICAL MARKETING
A
A collection of thought-provoking articles and advice from senior figures and highly respected brands in the marketing space, to start changing the conversation around fear and anxiety-based marketing.
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DISCUSSIONSGET ACTIVE AND INVOLVED IN““
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ai will transform marketingBut let’s talk ethics first- Paul Roetzer, Founder and CEO, Marketing AI Institute
We are about to enter an age
where awe-inspiring artificial
intelligence technologies will
increasingly power our countries,
companies, and lives.
In the marketing industry,
professionals who can harness
the power of AI will be able to do
more with less, run personalized
campaigns of unprecedented
complexity, and transform
business-as-usual through new
methods of machine-intelligent
marketing.
The potential business opportunity
is massive. AI has the potential
to unlock $2.6 trillion in business
value in marketing and sales alone,
according to McKinsey.
There’s just one problem. As
an industry, as citizens and as
professionals, we’re woefully
underprepared to deal with the
major ethical challenges presented
by this technology.
AI’s transformative power lies in its
ability to analyze massive amounts
of data, then make predictions and
recommend actions based on the
insights it brings to light from that
data. Using this power, marketers
and brands can plan, produce,
personalise, promote and perform
better - at scale.
The same power may also
produce outcomes that infringe on
rights, damage businesses, and
hurt society. Yet businesses and
individuals have collectively done
very little to establish rules and
guidelines for using AI responsibly.
At this stage, we have more
questions than answers.
How do we use AI to create wealth
without bankrupting consumer
rights? It’s not always clear how
these systems make decisions and
come to conclusions. Without some
transparency, it’s difficult to trust
intelligent systems with important
business and life decisions.
How do we build AI systems that give
us a competitive advantage, without
losing all control over decision-
making processes?
There are no easy answers to any
of these questions. That’s why
it’s so important that many more
people get active and involved
in discussions about how AI
impacts our citizens, countries, and
companies. Because AI is going to
affect everyone.
We created the Marketing AI Institute
to make AI more actionable and
approachable for modern marketers.
But we also feel that, along the
way, the marketing industry must do
much, much more to have honest
conversations about AI ethics. These
conversations must result in real
action.
Marketers, we’re ready to talk. We
hope you are too.
The Marketing AI Institute makes
artificial intelligence more
approachable and actionable for
modern marketers.
STAND AGAINST FEAR & ANXIETYLessons in ethical marketing
- Parry Malm, founder and CEO, Phrasee
One of the first bosses I ever had
in the marketing industry once told
me something that really depressed
me. “There are two reasons people
buy things Parry,” she said. “Those
reasons are guilt and anxiety.”
She believed that if a marketing
campaign could evoke these
negative emotions in a brand’s
audience, sales would invariably
follow. Although this strategy always
felt like a disreputable way to do
business, the sad truth was that it
sometimes worked.
The even sadder truth was that
following a marketing model
predicated on exploiting consumers’
negative emotions and making
people feel fearful, inadequate, and
guilty, made me feel ashamed to be
a marketer.
As my career continued to progress,
I decided to adopt a different
strategic philosophy. A philosophy
built on the belief that we, as
marketers, should focus our efforts
on making the world a better place,
rather than making people feel bad.
I believed that effective marketing
was still possible within a more
positive, respectful context.
As it turned out, I was right. In fact,
we at Phrasee have built a very
successful and rapidly growing
marketing company without
targeting or exploiting consumers’
negative emotions at all.
We’ve always believed that we
have a moral responsibility to not
intentionally exploit people using
negative emotions. Brands and
marketers shouldn’t have to trick
people into buying stuff. Once
a brand starts focusing on guilt,
anxiety or fear to sell its products,
the potential impact on consumers -
particularly those already in fragile
mental states - simply isn’t worth it.
Such tactics turn us from marketers
into exploiters.
If the products you’re selling are
good, and if the marketing you
use to sell those products is
well-built and effective, you’ll make
money, all without harming or
exploiting anyone!
That’s why we’re calling on all
marketers to join forces with us to
build a better marketing industry.
One where we all commit to use the
awesome power of marketing for
good. A marketing industry where the
idea of exploiting negative human
emotions for the purposes of selling
consumers products is a non-starter.
Why now? Because the mighty
marketing industry currently stands on
the cusp of its next great evolutionary
leap. Artificial intelligence, big
data, hyperpersonalisation,
and microtargeting are already
generating profound shifts in the
ways brands interact with consumers.
Thanks to the exponential growth of
these technologies and strategies,
marketing and advertising are
becoming more powerful by the day.
Their potential to manipulate and
exploit negative human emotions
may not be widely understood yet,
but it is definitely very real.
We have all been gifted a unique
opportunity to decide the path our
industry will take as it moves toward
its next iteration, building a better
marketing future for ourselves and
for our audiences. We have a moral
responsibility to make sure that
we put the emotional needs of the
public at large first, in every ad,
every email, and every marketing
campaign we have a hand in from
this day forward.
Why? Because emotions matter!
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MarketDifferently
How does your marketing measure up for mental health?
Constant deadlines, tight budgets
and sustained strategic risk-taking
are all part of the mix of a marketer’s
average day. With an eye on the
bottom line, the desire for a quick
win that will generate a fast profit
can often tip behaviour into
dubious practice.
But today’s consumers place more
value on a brand’s ethical behaviour
than ever before. There is a growing
belief in the market that brands need
to take responsibility for their actions
and move away from using fear
and anxiety to sell more products,
because these negative marketing
messages have a very real impact on
mental health.
Timothy Erblich, CEO of Ethisphere
Institute and a global leader
in defining and advancing the
standards of ethical business
practices, explains that ‘good ethics
is good business’. He points to the
growing body of data in the industry
which shows that the financial return
of ethics (ROE) is very significant.
Unethical marketing is the ongoing
target of legal action and lawsuits.
Research by Forbes reveals that in
the last decade companies have
paid billions of dollars in fines due to
ethical breaches – ethical behaviour
is no longer just a ‘nice to have’.
It could make the difference to a
brand’s future profitability and
long-term viability.
1 Don’t make false claims. It’s a
fairly basic starting point – tell
the truth. Don’t promise customers
benefits that your product simply
can’t deliver or ‘talk up’ the
advantages that your products and
services will confer.
2 Don’t exaggerate the facts or
distort the truth. Tell it like it is.
If your product is not ‘sugar-free’,
‘low-fat’ or ‘natural’, don’t say it
is. Don’t make broad, grandiose
statements unless you have
scientifically proven research and
case studies to back them up. Don’t
make statements that are out of
proportion or promote half-truths.
Advocate the positive benefits of
your products by all means – but
don’t distort your message.
3 Don’t promote messages
that exploit your customers’
emotions. Is your message
precisely tailored to make your
customers feel guilt, anger, anxiety
or other negative emotions? If
so, lose it. You’re preying on their
vulnerabilities, playing with their
mental health and exploiting their
emotions. It’s tasteless, unethical
and bad practice – and eventually
people will call you out on it.
4 Don’t use fear tactics. Is your
message designed to make
your customers fearful? Using high
pressure tactics to make people
experience severe levels of anxiety
and purchase products under duress
is morally questionable. Instead,
promote the positive advantages
of your product and steer clear of
generating negative emotions.
5 Don’t conceal important
information. In a world of
immediate access to information,
don’t be fooled into thinking that
you’re able to evade the truth by
concealing important product
or service information. Embrace
openness in your marketing. Better
a brand be open and earn itself
respect from its consumers than have
its truths spilled out in public forms –
and a bad reputation to follow suit.
6 Don’t bad-mouth your rivals.
Emphasise how your
product /service /offer stands out
in the market, but don’t run down
your rivals’ offering in the process. If
you make false or misleading claims
about another brand you could very
well find yourself in court. At the
very least, it’s unprofessional and
unethical, and people will quickly
see through you.
7 Don’t copy competitors.
Imitation may be the sincerest
form of flattery but imitating others too
closely – or passing their messages off
as your own – will quickly mark you out
as a fraud.
8 Don’t be racist, sexist, ageist
or fall foul of any other ‘ist’.
Don’t discriminate. Ensure that your
message doesn’t promote people
of a certain nationality, race, sex,
age or religion as being better than
others. Remember, social values
are constantly changing. Reputable
brands don’t discriminate and don’t
exploit any one group of people.
9 Don’t exploit children.
Exploiting childish naivety – of
potential customers who can’t evaluate
your marketing messages objectively
– is one of the most frowned upon
unethical marketing practices.
Don’t do it.
10 Don’t spam your customers.
Don’t bombard your
customers with unsolicited emails,
newsletters or direct messages,
urging them to buy your products.
Nobody likes a spammer and it’s
likely to have the reverse effect to
what you intended.
- Bernadette Fallon,
Lifestyle and technology writer
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LEARN FROM THE KEY PLAYERSAI, ethics and mental health
Artificial intelligence is an extremely powerful
technology. And like all powerful technologies, it has
its fair share of moral and ethical implications to deal
with. More than its fair share, in fact.
From 1927’s Metropolis to Isaac Asimov’s Three Laws
of Robotics, thinkers, dreamers, and intellectuals alike
have debated the implications AI technology could
SPOTLIGHT
SESSIONS
represent for its creators, humankind, and the world
as a whole.
So, as AI ethics moves to the forefront of the modern
technological conversation, what do today’s tech
thought-leaders think about what AI’s exponential
growth and widespread implementation means for
the future of humanity? Let’s take a look…
The Alan Turing Institute
The UK’s national institute for data
science and AI has taken a proactive
approach to protecting individuals
and society at large from abuse
at the hands of those who would
use data and AI technologies for
personal gain at the cost of others.
It has committed to “using data
science and AI technologies for
everyone’s benefit”.
Stephen Hawking
Theoretical physicist and cosmologist
Stephen Hawking had more than
one memorable quote regarding the
implications of AI and what it will
mean for humanity when machine
intelligence surpasses that of our
own race. “When it eventually does
occur, it’s likely to be either the best
or worst thing ever to happen to
humanity, so there’s huge value in
getting it right.”
The Leverhulme Centre for the
Future of Intelligence at Cambridge
The Leverhulme Centre for the
Future of Intelligence at Cambridge
brings together researchers from
computer science, philosophy, social
sciences, law and politics to explore
the development, opportunities and
challenges of AI. With a pragmatic
view on the progression of AI
technology, its goal is simply “to
bring together the best of human
intelligence so that we can make the
most of machine intelligence.”
Eliezer Shlomo Yudkowsky
American AI researcher Eliezer
Shlomo Yudkowsky, best known for
popularizing the concept of “friendly
AI”- AI which has an entirely positive
impact on humanity - has many
well-thought-out theories on where
AI technology should be directed
and how it should be constrained.
Nick Bostrom
As the founding director of the Future
of Humanity Institute at Oxford
University researching the impact
of future technologies, Swedish
philosopher Nick Bostrom has some
strong opinions on the nature of
intelligence. He believes that AI
represents a massive leap into the
unknown and that this leap must be
made only with extreme caution.
Joanna Bryson
Associate Professor in the
Department of Computing at Bath
University, Joanna Bryson specialises
in AI, ethics and collaborative
cognitions. She’s a member of the All
Party Parliamentary Group on AI and
a highly-regarded thought leader
in the AI field. In her essay “Robots
should be slaves”, Bryson focuses
on where AI should fit in society and
what its relationship with humans
should be.
- Stu Elmes,
Marketing technology writer
There’s a global shift in the minds of marketers to suit the growing conscience of consumers. Two leading players in the space discuss how these ideas are manifesting in the modern-day marketing environment.
Chris Walts, Social Strategy Director at Ogilvy UK
About Chris: Chris Walts has carved
out a comfortable niche for himself
as Social Strategy Director at Ogilvy
UK. Chris keeps his finger on the
pulse of new and emerging trends,
technologies and behaviours,
translating this knowledge into
tangible solutions for Ogilvy’s clients.
Q: How is the way brands represent
themselves on social media evolving
right now?
A: Consumers are prioritising where
they give their attention, which
in turn has led to a scepticism of
being sold to. To cut through the
tremendous amount of the noise and
‘fakenews’, brands are learning that
honesty, transparency, and utility
are key. Brands that understand
how to provide value – through
entertainment, utility, or inspiration –
are the ones consumers remember.
Q: Where is the relationship between
brands and social media platforms
headed in the years to come?
A: In an effort to provide greater
value to consumers, brands were
working hard to create frictionless,
personalised experiences.
Unfortunately, the correct rules and
regulations weren’t put in place,
and people’s personal data started
getting abused. Moving forward,
I think additional controls will be
added to let individuals decide
how and when they want their data
to be shared to create frictionless
personalisation.
Amy Williams, Social Entrepreneurand Good-Loop Founder
About Amy: The relationship
between internet users, content
publishers, and the brands that keep
publishers’ lights on is an awkward
and tenuous one. Enter Amy
Williams, Founder of Good-Loop – a
programmatic digital advertising
platform that “is respectful to users,
positive for brands and profitable for
publishers”.
Q: How does connecting brands’
digital advertising campaigns to
charitable donations benefit brands?
A: There are a couple of ways that
brands benefit from connecting
their marketing to good causes –
such as delivering a more positive
connection with consumers and a
much higher rate of engagement
with your content. But perhaps most
importantly, linking your brand with
bigger, more meaningful social
causes fundamentally helps you
to sell more stuff. Neilson found
that 66% of consumers are willing
to pay more for socially conscious
brands and this number moves to
around 90% when you look at only
millennials and Gen Z.
Q: What do brands and advertisers
need to do differently to be more
“respectful of users”?
A: Brands need to create a more
respectful and more positive
advertising experience for their
customers. So many ads online pop
up or auto-play and force us to watch
them. But if customers can choose
when to watch their ads and can get
something in return – you’re offering
a fairer value exchange to people.
Those people are going to feel more
positive about their online experience
and in turn, about your brand.
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PEOPLEHAVE TO COME FIRST
““
1716
WORD UP FROM SENIOR MARKETERSChanging the conversation
“At Hilton, all team members are personally responsible
for acting with integrity in order to enhance Hilton’s
reputation, client experience, and a healthy work
environment. We have built a culture to maintain the
highest ethical standards in the hospitality business,
ensuring our marketing activities are truthful and
accurate, with our audience receiving a positive and
transparent experience at every touch point.”
Marc LantrokSenior Manager CRM Client Servicesat Hilton Worldwide
“One of our core values at Virgin is to do business for
good. We pride ourselves on putting our customers first,
focusing on positive messaging - fear-based tactics are
not only unethical, but they’re also a lazy approach to
marketing. We wouldn’t associate ourselves with any
company or vendor that takes advantage of vulnerable
people by using fear tactics that promote anxiety. It’s just
not the Virgin Way.”
Saul LopesCustomer Lifecycle Leadat Virgin Holidays
“A core element that has enabled the Social Chain Group’s
success has been our ability to build one of the biggest
networks of social media communities in the world. To
grow hundreds of millions of followers, people have to
come first and be at the heart of everything we do. This
flows through into all key decisions across the business,
from what brands to work with, to what topics to lend our
voice to and what charities we support. If it doesn’t add
value to the audience or enhance their life in some way,
then it is an immediate red flag for us that we are veering
away from everything we stand for as a business.”
Alex AyinGroup Transformation Director at Social Chain Group
“Until recently, we were living in a marketing environment
where a brand had to show their potential customers
how great their products were against competitors’. But
this trend is slowly changing; brands are trying to raise
awareness about ethical matters, from environmental
ones like the massive “anti-plastic campaign”, to social or
political change like the recent Nike advertising campaign.
Brands are starting to use marketing with the purpose
of sharing their values with an audience, becoming
something much bigger than promoting a product or a
service, if not the emotional value behind them.“
Sara Cartelle BucetaAccount Director at Tomorrow | TTH
“I strongly support the work Phrasee is doing on Emotions
Matter. I believe that marketers should value and respect
their customers enough to market to them as they would
like to be marketed to. I think that great marketing comes
from putting brands /products /services into the context of
people’s lives. If you ignore that, you can end up with one
dimensional messaging, often based on fear or anxiety.
This kind of negative messaging can give marketers a
bad name and alienate customers. And customers are
people, just like us. That’s why Emotions Matter.”
Matt ButtonHead of CRM and Social at Gumtree.com
1918
TECHNOLOGY’S ROLE IN MENTAL HEALTHIn conversation with Dr Fjola Helgadottir,
PhD R.Psych
health. It can lead to feelings of
isolation and depression, as well
as negatively impacting our social
skills, concentration levels, attention
spans and sleep patterns; there’s
an emotional risk. From a pragmatic
standpoint, brands in the corporate
marketing technology space bear a
moral and social responsibility not to
put pressure on their customers, using
the technology at their disposal.
Dr Helgadottir agrees. “If technology
is only designed for the purpose of
capturing our attention, that is not
necessarily going to be good for us.
Algorithms are only as good as their
intended purpose. If we are stuck to
our phones all the time, that is not
promoting good mental health – we
need technology to help us, not to
create negative situations.”
Brands may not be using technology
in negative ways intentionally. But
using high pressure tactics to make
people experience severe levels
of anxiety and purchase products
under duress is a very disingenuous
way of using technology.
When it comes to using technology for
good, Dr Helgadottir is most excited
about the potential of using new
technology to help people engage
with evidence-based therapy.
“Therapy is hard,” she says. “That’s
true regardless of how it is being
delivered, whether by a human or
machine. But because people today
spend so much time connected, we
can use this time to make positive
change and real connections.”
And the future looks interesting.
Following Matt Hancock’s
appointment as Secretary of
State for Health and Social Care
earlier this summer, the Mental
Health Foundation has called on
him to embrace the role digital
technologies can play in preventing
and treating mental health problems
and their potential to benefit more
people than can be reached by
current service models alone. It
seems clear that the drive to use
technology to positively impact
mental health is set to continue.
So, how is this affecting our mental
health, and what role should
technology play in a world that is
becoming increasingly defined by it?
On the other side of the coin,
technology has made vast
improvements to our everyday life
and, more specifically, technology
is improving mental health care in
many ways. The Office of National
Statistics revealed that 90% of all
adults in the UK now use the internet,
and according to the Mental Health
Foundation, “with this growth of
the internet, online spaces and
smartphone apps, healthcare services
are beginning to use these developing
technologies to help monitor health
and prevent and treat any problems”.
Dr Helgadottir, AI-Therapy founder,
has established Overcome Social
Anxiety (OSA), a fully-automated
treatment programme for social
anxiety, which has already treated
people from over 30 countries.
It’s a strong example of how new
technology can impact our mental
health in a very positive way. When
it comes to mental health, she is
adamant that technology should be
used to reach people who are not
currently being helped.
“There is a lot of research behind the
decision-making that helps people
with mental health problems and
technology can play a big role in
disseminating these evidence-based
practices,” she confirms. “Technology
can provide a set of tools that has
the potential to reach and benefit
millions of people.”
“Just this year, we published
a randomised control trial in
collaboration with the University of
British Columbia, which showed,
using the most robust scientific
method, that the program is highly
effective. In fact, it was just as
effective, and in some circumstances
even more effective, than human-
delivered treatment programs.”
Technology at its worst, as
certain experts like to remind us,
can adversely affect our mental
Technology in the 21st century has revolutionised our lives with its game-changing tools and resources. It’s changed the way we interact and communicate, how we pay our bills and eat our dinners. From hardware to software, the tiny computers we carry in our pockets and the innovations that make them run, technology in the form of digital media permeates every part of our lives.
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AI ETHICS POLICY
Why everyone should have one...
We’re surprised AI ethics policies
aren’t more commonplace and
that we appear to be one of the
few companies not only promoting
what we believe in, but also putting
our head above the parapet about
it. If we’re going to get the wider
marketing community to realise
the commercial benefits of AI, we
also need to put the fundamentals
in place and collectively drive an
ethical marketing agenda.
This starts with committing to paper
what we will and won’t do for the
greater good.
We won’t: use data to target
vulnerable populations, promote the
use of negative emotions to exploit
people or work with customers
whose values don’t align with ours.
We will: take action to avoid
prejudice and bias, be open about
what our AI does and stick to our
values, pledging not to change our
ethics policy, though we may add to
it when required. We think of it like
our constitution.
“Marketers are getting a bad rap
recently and are a victim of their own
actions because for years they have
been encouraged to use spurious
tactics to get people to buy more
stuff,” explains Parry Malm, Phrasee
founder and CEO.
Writing in The Entrepreneur, digital
marketer Aaron Haynes says that
only ethical marketing will stand the
test of time and is critical for
business success.
“Any business perceived to lack
ethics is seen as lacking a moral
compass, having doubtful product
quality and holding no corporate
community concern. When a lack of
ethics becomes public knowledge,
businesses lose credibility,” he
explains.
And the call for high ethical
standards is only going to get
louder. A recent survey carried out
by financial protection providers
Aflac found that 92% of millennial
consumers are more likely to buy
products from ethical companies.
And 82% of those consumers believe
ethical brands outperform similar
companies that lack a commitment
to ethical principles.
“I think it’s high time that marketers
took responsibility for their actions
and realise there is more to what
we do than just selling a few more
widgets,” says Parry. “We actually
bear a social responsibility, and if
marketers want to create enduring
relationships with customers, they
need to stop treating people like
bottomless pits of surplus to
extract. They need to move away
from using fear and anxiety to sell
more products and take a more
positive approach.”
“In a high-tech world, having a strong
ethical approach is more important
than ever”, says Phrasee co-founder
and COO, Victoria Peppiatt.
“I think it’s so important to educate
consumers about how companies
are using AI. As an AI marketing tech
company, we have the responsibility
of using AI transparently, so that
consumers understand why and how
we’re using the technology to better
experiences, rather than supporting
negative engagement. AI ethics
policies are the future for all tech
companies, which is why I’m so proud
that Phrasee is leading the way with
our open approach to AI ethics.”
So it seems we’re all on the same
page here. And at Phrasee, we’re
keen to lead the charge, kicking if off
with our ethics policy, pledging not
to use technology to explicitly exploit
vulnerable populations.
We believe that marketing can
change the world. And we’re calling
on the industry to consider the effect
its work has on the world at large.
It’s time to start the debate.
Will you join us?
AI companies have a social responsibility to consumers to be open about what exactly they are doing with this technology - and how. Phrasee is proud to be one of the first companies in the world working in AI for marketing to do so. We’re taking the lead and codifying what we believe to be an ethical way to run an AI business. We’ve drawn up an ethics policy that is practical, specific and explicit.
Will you join us?www.phrasee.co/emotions-matter
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AI ETHICS POLICY
...and here’s ours
Artificial Intelligence sometimes gets a bad rap… because it can be used for good… but it can also be used for evil.
We at Phrasee believe that AI should be used for good. As one of the fastest-growing AI companies in the world, we believe it’s our responsibility to put our money where our mouth is.
No one has done what we’re doing at Phrasee before, so there are no obvious standards for us to follow. And as widespread use of AI is such a new thing, there aren’t many examples for us to learn from. So, we’re just going to do what we feel is right – and be open and transparent about it.
Our goal isn’t to build The Terminator, or “General AI”. Our goal is to give every marketing team in the world the chance to have a machine-powered copywriter that gets results.
Following are the ethics that we’ve learned since founding Phrasee in 2015. Have we always been perfect? Nope, we are but humans! So that’s why we’re putting this policy in place. As our business expands, we need to ensure that our ethical beliefs remain steadfast.
We’ve not made any wide-reaching, ambiguous statements like “don’t be evil”. We believe that our ethics policy needs to be practical, specific and explicit. Therefore, we’ve decided to outline these policies, with examples where possible.
Things we won’t do
We won’t use data to target vulnerable populations. It’s possible, for example, that a machine learning
algorithm could identify bi-polar people about to enter
a mania phase… and then suggest you target them with
extravagant product offers. Or, say someone has recently
gone through a breakup, or worse, a bereavement, and
people used AI to exploit their emotional state. We do not
believe using AI to these ends is ethical. We believe that
even though a machine’s prediction may be right, that
doesn’t mean we should use it to exploit people. We will
NEVER use data like this.
We won’t promote the use of negative emotions to exploit people. Some people and companies suggest selecting messages
that explicitly focus on “fear, guilt and anxiety.” We
believe that people shouldn’t be treated like this. We, as
marketers, shouldn’t make people feel fearful, guilty and
anxious; instead, we should focus on the positive aspects
of our brands. We will NEVER encourage our customers to
use negative emotions to target their consumers.
We will not work with customers whose values don’t align with ours. In the past we have actively turned down working with
companies that we believe are harmful to society or have
unscrupulous business models. All potential customers go
through a review process to make sure their ethics align
with ours. We will not work with: gun & weapon retailers,
political parties or any company that promotes hate
speech or the marginalisation of segments of society. The
individuals who work for these types of organisations are
probably nice people, and we’d love to work with you
when you switch industries. But for now, it’s not for us.
Things we will do
Take action to avoid prejudice and bias. First off, we ensure our team itself is diverse. Phrasee is
gender balanced, has staff members from many countries
around the world, many socio-economic profiles, ages,
sexual orientations, ethnic backgrounds and political
beliefs. Secondly, we actively develop methods to identify
and remove prejudice from our data sets. This ensures our
models are generalised, and any small amount of biased
data is washed out during training.
Be open about what our AI does. We use AI to do two very specific tasks: to generate
human-sounding, brand-compliant marketing copy, and
to predict the performance of that copy in the wild. We
do not use AI for other purposes, and if/when we do, we
will be open about it. Our customers deserve to know
what we do, and that we aren’t hiding any secret, evil
development schemes.
We will not change this policy. We will monitor it and add to it when required. We view this ethics policy like the US Constitution. So, the
core text will not change. However, ethics are not static,
and adapt over time (just remember that gay marriage
wasn’t legal in most of the world 15 years ago!). The
world around us changes. When our policy needs to be
amended, we will transparently add amendments at
the end of the document, dated and with reasons. This
way you can always see where we stand, and what
we stand for.
EMOTIONS MATTER......more than you think.
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