Marketing in the Digital Age: Cambridge Analytica and Ethical Concerns

This report examines the Cambridge Analytica case study, a British political consulting firm involved in data misappropriation and strategic communication during electoral processes. The report explores the business opportunities CA identified in the 2016 US election, focusing on their use of Facebook user data and services provided to the Trump campaign. It analyzes what could have been done differently before the scandal, emphasizing communication strategies, corporate social responsibility, and brand awareness. The report further discusses the value of data in business and politics, the challenges faced by Facebook, and the interplay between public goodwill and data-driven technology companies. The report concludes with an overview of the work and services provided by Cambridge Analytica to the Trump campaign, including their use of data analytics and strategic messaging to influence voters and the challenges faced by Facebook.

Marketing in a digital age and corporate
social responsibility

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
1) Business opportunities for Cambridge Analytica..............................................................3
2) what could have been better before the Scandal...............................................................4
3) Value of the Data for the influence on the decision making , in business and politics......6
4) Work and services provided by Cambridge Analytica to the Trump’s Campaign............7
5) How do Public license to operate and data driven technology companies interrelate......8
6) challenges faced by the facebook application....................................................................9
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................9
REFERNCESS...............................................................................................................................11

INTRODUCTION
Digital marketing is the tool which Allow marketers to promote their products at the
digital platforms. This has huge impact on the company and they can reach to their desire
customers and gain competitive advantages. Digital platforms allow those companies to use the
data of the customers for the campaigns. Most of the companies use customer’s personal data
negatively.
This report will cover the case study of Cambridge Analytica which was British Political
consulting firm which combined Misappropriation of the data Brokerage , digital assets and
data analysis with the strategic communication during the electoral processes. This report will
analyze the business opportunities for the Cambridge Analytica from the campaign and how
they this company capture it (Tuten, and Solomon., 2017). This will also conclude what could
been done before the scandal in 2017 and earlier. This report will explain the value of the data
for influence decision making , in business as well as politics. It will provide the information
about the services provided by the Cambridge Analytica company for the Trump Campaign. This
report will consider that how do public Goodwill to operate and data driven technology
companies interrelate. In the end of this repot will cover the challenges face by the Facebook.
1) Business opportunities for Cambridge Analytica
Cambridge Analytica was British Political consulting firm which combined
Misappropriation of the data Brokerage , digital assets and data analysis with the strategic
communication during the electoral processes. In 2016 US election this company sees the
opportunity to earn profit from the election campaign and their target was promote campaign
for the Trump and make him president of the United America. They is a opportunity to promote
and earn money from the campaign to make that campaign successful this company stole the
data from the facebook which was around 50 million (Godey and et.al., 2016). Facebook only
allow seeing the name and emailing of the persona but this company tracks every detail of the
users which was illegal because they cannot access every data of the users without their
permission. This data they use it for the campaign and show the good image of the Trump in
their campaign. It was like a brainwash of the people by showing the manipulated data and the
things which are fake but this company earn money by those campaign and their campaign

become successful and Troup become president of the United America. Cambridge Analytica
see this opportunity to make profit for their company but this work was illegal because they do
not have rights to use any persons personal data for their profit purpose without taking
permission from them. They have to track permission from the users otherwise it’s an illegal for
the companies to still anyone’s data without their permission but this company. Cambridge
Analytica become greedy because of the election money and during the election campaign,
political parties spends billions of dollars to the companies so they can reach to the people and
convince them to vote to their party. They also got opportunity from the republic party which
was Trumps party and they get the target to reach to the people and the deal the agreement
for the champagne (Wang and Kim., 2017). Cambridge Analytica wanted to earn high profit
from the campaign because the president campaign held after the 5 years and this was the
only opportunity for the Cambridge Analytica company to make money in this campaign so
they give offer to the Dr Alekesander Kogan which is an Psychology professor at the Cambridge
university and offer them 80000 dollar t0o make an application which can able to steal data
from the facebook users. This application made by the Kogan helps to steal the data and with
the personal information of the people they started brainwashing people and convince them to
vote for the republic party. This was the main reason which helps Troup to won the elections
and they earn huge amount of profit from the campaign but this truth revel by their one of the
co- workers and tell every detail about this company illegally steal the data of the people and
they convince people to vote for the Trump (Stephen., 2016). This also creates challenge for the
facebook regarding to their privacy polices because they were getting money from the
Cambridge Analytica to run their campaign on the facebook.
2) what could have been better before the Scandal
The Scandal done by the Cambridge Analytica company creates many problem which
create trust issues among the people on the onli9ne platform. They were also having
opportunity to run the 2016 campaign with the right way. There are some strategies which
they should use to make their campaign successful without doing any illegal activity.
Communication strategy and message – To broke the Scandal Cambridge Analytica company
should use communication strategy and clear message to the people that time. They should

not post fake new on their campaign and their message should be clear and proper which can
be helpful for the Cambridge Analytica company to lead them towards the successful campaign.
Proper strategy of the campaign can make companies successful so they should look for the
better and improve campaign more than maculating the user’s data and their privacy (Etter,
Fieseler and Whelan., 2019). They should not use the personal data of the users without their
permission. The give money to make the software for them that money can be used to make
their campaign so that they should invest those amount on the campaign improvement.
Cooperate social responsibility – It is important for the companies to give importance to social
work because it is their responsibility which is necessary for the every business. Cambridge
Analytica Company steals the data of the facebook users for their profit purpose and they
forget their social responsibility. They could make it better if they look for their responsibility
toward the social and they were do9ing just opposite to it and they were illegally using their
personal data and spreading fake information on their social media accounts (Elden, Cakir,
and Bakir., 2016). It can be more better if they spread some positive news to the public and
because most of the promotional companies promote Campaign by spreading the fake new.
They can exposed their campaign that time which is their social responsibility toward the
society.
Impact on brand awareness- It is was unethical behavior from the Cambridge Analytica
company because they look for the profit and just to earn high revenue they illegally misuse
the facebook users data. This is illegal and they cannot do it without having permission from
the people. In the campaign they should look for the governmental low and regulation and they
should not misuse the data provided by the social media platforms. This misleading create huge
impact on the brand awareness and brand trust (Chauhan, Garg and Chhikara., 2019). Now they
will not able to trust on the social media and this shows that they people are not safe their data
used by the social media application are not secure. The data can be used for the positive
purpose such as brand awareness and the promotion of the products. Cambridge Analytica
company should use it for their brand awareness which can lead their campaign more
successful and more better for the people.

3) Value of the Data for the influence on the decision making , in business and politics
Data plays important role for the campaign activities without having proper data business
and political parties cannot run their campaign so they need proper data of the particular
population so they can promote their campaign and find the people to whom they can show
their advertisement. It has huge imp-act on the promotional activities and every companies use
the data driven to promote their campaign on the social media. Social media platforms provide
data about their users and companies use this data for their personal campaign promotion.
All the business and political parties run their campaign to attract people towards them. In the
business point of view data is need for the promotional activities because it is important for
them to spread awareness about their products so they take help of the social media and target
the people who can buy their products according to the their searches on the Google. Social
media track thei8r activities and show advertisement accordingly (Hadjimanolis., 2017). Most of
the companies ask for the data to reach to the people and this is social responsibility of the
those companies to use it for the products promotion because it is their social responsibility .
All they social media platforms give them vary less data about their users such as their name
and picture not more than that. They cannot share more than that because its illegal and has
huge impact on the society. In the point of view of the Politics, they need to run their campaign
of the social media platform so they can convince people to vote for them but most so the
politicians use the users data to promote negative campaigning which is illegal and they use it
for their own purpose. This create ethical issues and it is important for the facebook and other
social media platforms to look for those campaign and if they are spreading any fake news to
the people than they should stop getting them viral because it is their social responsibility to
stop this fake news which provide wrong information to the society. Government has make
registration related to the data driven that social media platforms cannot provide data to the
companies and social media without having their permission and they can only provide their
name and their e- mail for the promotional activities (Lin and et.al., Microsoft Technology).
This is also a social responsibility of the companies and political parties to use it or the
promotional activities but they should not use it for their own. Leak of the personal informant
data can create big problem for the society because this can be use to spread negative things

and fake nes on their account and they can also be harsh by the people. Social media
companies should increase the privacy towards the data driven and they should provide very
little information about their users so companies and political parties cannot use it to spread
negative campaign.
4) Work and services provided by Cambridge Analytica to the Trump’s Campaign
The British mining firm Cambridge Analytica has gone from unexplained genius to
possible defendant as details appear about its role in Donald Trump's 2016 election campaign.
With conventional strategist Steve Bannon played a founding role, backed by money from
billionaire Robert Mercer and his daughter Rebekah, the firm was able to develop data from 50
million Facebook users into a psychologically-based strategy to target voters. This company has
huge role in their campaign, they illegally stole the data of the facebook users and use it for the
campaign. They share the face news on their campaign and negative things and Photoshop
pictures about the opponents which helps the Republic party to won the election effectively
with the huge margin in the public votes.
Cambridge Analytica ahs huge role in the tromp’s campaign , according to the News
reports Cambridge Analytica firm as handling every aspect which can make this possible for the
Donald Trump to won the 2016 elections (Licensing LLC, 2016). They claimed that this was
possible fo0r the all of the research, analytics and data and the television campaign but the
British firm Cambridge Analytica runs into the Federal statute which bars the foreign
involvement in the US election. The Governmental Law strengthened after the 1996 bill Clinton
re- election effecorts has to disgorge millions of the dollars from the illegal donors.
The campaign of the Trump paid to the Cambridge Analytica almost 5.9 million , which
was confirmed by the Federal Election Commission data processed by the nonprofit center for
the responsive polices. The Campaign’s filing give their statement that the firm provided data
management and their researches by the surveys. But the estimated for the How much data is
worth , as proceeded by the Cambridge Analytica, run much higher , If the company gave the
data or sold it at the less than their market value , this means that the transaction would
amount to the campaign contribution a twofer violation of the governmental laws , which bass
corporation and the foreign national.

Cambridge Analytica wanted to earn high profit from the campaign because the
president campaign held after the 5 years and this was the only opportunity for the Cambridge
Analytica company to make money in this campaign so they give offer to the Dr Alekesander
Kogan which is an Psychology professor at the Cambridge university and offer them 80000
dollar to make an application which can able to steal data from the facebook users ( Zhang and
et.al., Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC, 2017). This application made by the Kogan helps to
steal the data and with the personal information of the people they started brainwashing
people and convince them to vote for the republic party. This was the main reason which
helps Troup to won the elections and they earn huge amount of profit from the campaign but
this truth revel by their one of the co- workers and tell every detail about this company
illegally steal the data of the people and they convince people to vote for the Republic party.
5) How do Public license to operate and data driven technology companies interrelate
Face book is using data driven technology and they take the personal information to
their users and this is their responsibility to secure their personal. People give them their
personal information to the facebook because of their market goodwill and their reputation in
the market. They are operating their businesses at the international level which create trust
among the people but if some other parties steal their data, it will affect on their good will and
it will be hard for the public to trust them again. T6his will be very challenging for this company
to create trust among the people. This will also affect t on their profitability and they will not
able to bring new technology at their workplace which can be, ore secure and better and
protect the data of the users. This is because the data driven technology and the public trust
are interrelated. They need to create trust and make them sure that their data is safe and they
do not need the track tension about it. It is important t for the companies who is using data
driven technology should make the users data personal and more securable so the other
companies cannot hack and steal the data from those companies. Most of the people are
spending their time on the social media and they give their personal information to the
application so they can access the social media and this is important for the social media to
make the user data more secure.

6) challenges faced by the facebook application
Cambridge Analytica rise the challenges for the facebook as well because they use facebook
application to run their campaign and according to some articles Facebook was cooperating
the Cambridge Analytica because they were knowing that this company is using personal
information of the public but they do not take any strict action against the Cambridge
Analytica. There was no major reaction come from the Facebook application, this rise the
question on this application. This also affect on the users of the facebook because they are not
able to trust on the privacy of the facebook (Oleksy, Berce and Hammond., Microsoft
Technology Licensing LLC, 2018). This company is working on the global level and they are
having huge regulation in all around the world if the users data is not safe on the face book
than public cannot trust on the social media. After the case of Cambridge Analytica users of
the facebook shift their account to the other social media platforms because of their privacy
issues. People do not want their data get shared with the others because this can affect on
their personal life as well. There are many political parties who are spreading fake news on the
facebook account and using personal data of the facebook data but there is not strict action
against them. This all post are misguiding the people,. During the Braxit act Cambridge
Analytica also use this application ton convince people to ready for the Braxit and after that
this political campaign make this application get in trouble. Facebook use data driven
technology to get the data and they do not provide those data to any political parties and
companies them also Cambridge Analytica was able to get the data of the 50 million Facebook
uses which rise the question on the security and privacy of the facebook application. It is
important for the facebook application to take st5rong actions against the people who are
spreading the fake news on their application and they should not provide their user data to any
of the company or political campaign. They need to increases their privacy and their security at
their application so people feel safe by using these social media platforms. They should block
the people who are spreading fake new on their platforms.
CONCLUSION
As per the report has been analyzed the business opportunities for the Cambridge
Analytica from the campaign and how this company capture it. This report also has been

concluded what could been done before the scandal in 2017 and earlier. This report has been
explained the value of the data for influence decision making, in business as well as politics. It
has been provided the information about the services provided by the Cambridge Analytica
company for the Trump Campaign. This report has been considered that how do public
Goodwill to operate and data driven technology companies interrelate. In the end of this repot
has been cover the challenges face by the Facebook.

REFERNCESS
Books and journal
Tuten, T. L. and Solomon, M. R., 2017. Social media marketing. Sage.
Godey, B. and et.al., 2016. Social media marketing efforts of luxury brands: Influence on brand
equity and consumer behavior. Journal of business research. 69(12). pp.5833-5841.
Wang, Z. and Kim, H. G., 2017. Can social media marketing improve customer relationship
capabilities and firm performance? Dynamic capability perspective. Journal of Interactive
Marketing. 39. pp.15-26.
Stephen, A. T., 2016. The role of digital and social media marketing in consumer
behavior. Current Opinion in Psychology. 10. pp.17-21.
Etter, M., Fieseler, C. and Whelan, G., 2019. Sharing economy, sharing responsibility? Corporate
social responsibility in the digital age. Journal of Business Ethics. 159(4). pp.935-942.
Elden, M., Cakir, S. Y. and Bakir, U., 2016, September. Corporate Social Responsibility
Campaigns in the Digital Age: The Case of Vodafone “Red Light Application/Between Us”.
In Conference on e-Business, e-Services and e-Society (pp. 120-127). Springer. Cham.
Chauhan, U., Garg, R. and Chhikara, R., 2019. Corporate Social Responsibility and Digital
Marketing. In Handbook of Research on Digital Marketing Innovations in Social
Entrepreneurship and Solidarity Economics (pp. 293-309). IGI Global.
Hadjimanolis, A., 2017. A BARRIERS APPROACH TO CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY (CSR)
ADOPTION IN SMES. Contemporary Perspectives in Corporate Social Performance and Policy:
The Middle Eastern Perspective. p.95.
Lin, J.H. and et.al., Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC, 2016. Data driven composite location
system using modeling and inference methods. U.S. Patent 9,507,747.
Zhang, Y. and et.al., Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC, 2017. Data-driven schema for
describing and executing management tasks in a graphical user interface. U.S. Patent
9,645,719.
Oleksy, J. M., Berce, B. and Hammond, B.M., Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC, 2018. Object
templates for data-driven applications. U.S. Patent 10,127,218.