Ethical aspects of guerrilla and ambush marketing

The term business ethics was derived in the middle of the last century from the term medical ethics, which was adopted about a decade earlier by people interested in ethical problems in medicine. Thus, "business ethics is not any particular ethic that constrains business in the way that other human and social endeavours do, but does not allow business to do what is not allowed in other areas of life". [Dee George, 2003, 31] In order to investigate what represents good or wrong, right or wrong, what is a virtue, law, consciousness, duty, obligations of people, ethics is here to give us an answer or to point out the existence of supposedly simple but actually difficult ethical problems. [Prnjat,

Business ethics can generally be seen as adhering to the principles, values and standards of the marketing profession. These ethical requirements go beyond the legal regulations and concern all procedures and activities. In everyday business, marketing experts encounter situations in which they wonder what is the right thing to do, even if undertaking a certain activity will not come into conflict with the law or violate the company's rules. These morally problematic business situations are considered ethical dilemmas in which the question should be asked about whether what has been done will be fair and equally good for all parties involved and whether it is truly the right procedure to be proud of and praised. People mostly feel the difference between correct and incorrect business behaviour, regardless of whether what they judge is regulated by law or not. Legal provisions very often cannot predict all those business situations that may occur. Most often, laws are passed as a reaction based on already existing unethical business behaviour. By setting boundaries that should not be crossed and nurturing ethical business, marketers should follow the Golden

There is no doubt that the effects of campaigns dedicated to branding are constantly decreasing, while the costs of reaching consumers, which are becoming increasingly difficult to attract, are growing all over the world. It is clear that this business is becoming increasingly difficult, given the growing indifference and growing cynicism of consumers. In today's world, where we encounter a large number of marketing messages every day, one justified question arises - where is the limit to which something ceases to be merely present, but becomes irritating and unethical? Ying Fan [Fan, 2005, 3] in his paper, where he deals with the question of what ethical branding means, reminds that despite the fact that ethics is a very complex area, where ethical branding is equated with ethical marketing, every brand needs not only economic and financial evaluation and criterion, but also moral evaluation and criterion.

The Ethical Statement of the American Marketing Association, or "Ethical Standards and Values for Marketers," reads in part: "People engaged in marketing need to understand that they are not only serving their businesses but also acting as managers in society by creating, facilitating and performing efficient and effective transactions that are part of the wider economy." "Advertising should be honourable. It must not seduce public opinion or belittle and harm the competition, nor count on the gullibility of the audience." [Kovačević, 2006, 235]. Thus, the duty to do what is morally right (Aqe quod agis - do "well" whatever you do), avoid what is morally wrong, has been present since ancient times. Taking into account the above, that marketers should accept the highest ethical norms and ethical values and must not cause harm in the first place, the question of correctness and ethics of guerrilla and ambush marketing arises.

1.    Impact of Covid-19 on the advertising and sponsorship industry

Based on these data and the situation caused by COVID-19, it is clear that brands could reduce their advertising costs and their sponsorship agreements in the future, as supply chain issues or sales reductions affect their business. A survey of brands in China at the end of February (2020) showed that 7% completely stopped advertising and 14% switched their budgets from sponsorship, TV commercials, etc., to internet promotion. The growth rate of advertising in China is predicted to fall from 7% - predicted before the pandemic - to 3.9%. In this situation, not only athletes and sports organizations lose. For many sponsors, sporting events and related sponsorships often contribute significantly to a company’s brand building strategy and overall marketing strategy. Once matches and sporting events are cancelled or postponed, the ability of the sponsor to implement carefully planned marketing and branding strategies decreases. In the case of the COVID-19 epidemic, the number of sponsorship agreements dropped drastically in just two months, by 40% in March, compared to January and the beginning of the epidemic. [GlobalData, 2020]

Such data are very important, if we know that individual athletes earn many times more from their sponsorship agreements than from professional contracts in their clubs, competitions, etc. (Table 1).

This is the first time that a tennis player has become the highest paid athlete in the world in the annual Forbes list, which has been published for the last 30 years. Of the tennis players, Novak Djokovic follows him with 44.6 million, and 32 million were brought to him by sponsorship agreements, which brought him 23rd place in the competition of the highest paid active athletes in the world. The second place went to the Portuguese football player Cristiano Ronaldo, 105 million, of which 45 from sponsors. Tiger Woods earned 62.3 of which 60 million were from sponsors.

Table 1. Ratio of athletes' income from contracts (earnings from wins) and income from sponsors in the period May 2019-May 2020.

Rank	Name	Earnings	Salary /wins	Sponsorship	Sport
1.	Roger Federer	106.3	6.3	100.0	Tennis
2.	LeBron James	88.2	28.2	60.0	Basketball
3.	Tiger Woods	62.3	2.3	60.0	Golf
4.	Cristiano Ronaldo	105.0	60.0	45.0	Football
5.	Stephen Curry	74.4	30.4	44.0	Basketball
6.	Phil Mickelson	40.8	0.8	40.0	Golf
7.	Naomi Osaka	37.4	3.4	34.0	Tennis
8.	Novak Đoković	44.6	12.6	32.0	Tennis
9.	Serena Williams	36.0	4.0	32.0	Tennis
10.	Kei Nishikori	32.1	1.1	31.0	Tennis

Source: adapted according to: [Forbes, 2020]

The sports industry has been growing steadily in recent years. The increase in value mainly comes from a large increase in revenues from broadcasting contracts and advertising. This is also complemented by the expansion of commercial sponsorship. However, that growth and financial income mostly disappeared as a result of the epidemic, Covid-19. American sports leagues and their collective agreements typically limit player income to about 50% of league income. However, other sports leagues usually allow each club to determine individually what it is willing to pay in player costs. UEFA raises a red flag on which the costs of the player staff exceed 70% of the football club's income. Some sports clubs released players who were unwilling to accept salary reductions or deferrals. With expiring player contracts, the situation is also further complicated. Still, a number of sports clubs and their playing staff have agreed to compromises. For example, the French Football First League has agreed with a player union that there will be a reduction in salaries throughout the league of up to 50%, depending on the salary of each player. [Warren, 2020]

Depending on the long-term impact of Covid-19 on the economy, sponsors may face serious liquidity problems, making it difficult or impossible for them to meet their commitments. In such a scenario, individual sponsors may be forced to terminate sponsorship agreements. For example, it was announced that Adidas and Emirates, the two main sponsors of the Real Madrid football team, faced critical financial difficulties. As a result, their national governments provided them with financial support to enable them to continue running their business as before. However, it is evident that not everyone will be so fortunate; there will be many companies with financial problems that may not be able to receive such assistance from their governments and that will struggle to meet the obligations of their sponsorship agreements. [Garcimartin et al. 2020] Due to this situation, but also the fact that sponsorship is a vital tool for new sources of money for sports, it is important to set certain standards that should be strictly protected. The emergence of ambush marketing is an activity that can harm the essence of sponsorship. It can take many forms, but in essence, it is an attack on exclusivity that most commercial sports partners seek and want, to a limited extent, to gain. Sponsorship exclusivity is an element of sponsorship that is most often attacked by parasitic companies. The media (especially TV) play a decisive role in public opinion regarding the connection between the sponsor and the sponsored entity. It is obvious that this form of covert marketing (or ambush marketing) can only be done intentionally. [Jagodić analyse them separately in this paper.

2.    Guerrilla Marketing

Guerrilla marketing was devised by Jay Conrad Levinson [2008, 13], who claims that he relies on the "brute force of vivid imagination, that it is the art of changing people’s opinions, every bit of contact companies have with the outside world, to measure and predict behaviour, they influence people and thus determine the "amount of marketing". Guerrilla marketing uses well-known means of marketing and promotion, such as: personal sales, telemarketing, advertising on bulletin boards, sending personal mail, distribution of free samples, advertising in special magazines, organizing seminars, creating promotional products, organizing product demonstrations, internet promotion, monitoring the mood of clients, websites, etc. Monitoring the mood and behaviour of target groups is the basis and guideline for shaping further activities of guerrilla marketing. Here we can emphasize the importance of research in marketing, as a process whose importance is reaffirmed in new marketing activities. It arose because of the financial pressure that small businesses in the United States suffered and why these companies were encouraged and forced to look for more innovative ways to advertise their products using only a minimal amount of marketing budget to compete with larger companies.

Whether it is a big or small sporting event, they are certainly an opportunity for promotion and positive publicity not only for official sponsors, but also for those who are not. [Masterman, 2008, 276] Guerrilla marketing is one of the newer ways of promotion that participants in today's market are increasingly using. This type of promotion includes unconventional, unique, unexpected activities and ways of realization. As we mentioned, this marketing concept is considered to be designed for small companies as an event that only happens once, after which consumers talk about it and pass the information on to others. There are many such examples, both among smaller and larger market participants, such as Puma, Ikea, Adidas, Pepsi-Cola, Nike, and other. There are also examples of failed guerrilla marketing, such as the Cartoon Network campaign. The company has posted dozens of flashy placards in 10 cities as part of its promotional campaign. However, among the residents of Boston (January 2007), rumours began to circulate that it was a terrorist act, i.e. that terrorists were planting explosives. The incident escalated rapidly, the team for dismantling the bombs went to the field, the traffic was stopped, the bridges were closed, etc. In the end, manager Jim Samples was fired and the parent company Turner Broadcasting was fined $ 2 million [Dašić, 2018, 65]. Guerrilla marketing is a great alternative to traditional marketing. It succeeds in original thinking and creativity, where imagination and ingenuity replace big budgets. Guerrilla marketing tends to be cheaper than traditional marketing, relying on ideas and creativity.

Marjanović [2018, 265] also separates these two terms (guerrilla and ambush marketing) and states numerous differences. Although guerrillas mostly attack from ambush, guerrilla marketing and ambush marketing are not the same story! While ambush marketing can be easily linked to sports, because it is mainly related to sponsorships, guerrilla marketing can be used in any type of marketing (products, services, but also sports). Let's draw a war analogy again: if large and strong armies (companies) can afford large offensives, heavy artillery, aviation, etc., then small armies (companies) must manage according to their resources. That is how the guerrilla form of warfare came about, but that is how J.K. Levinson devised guerrilla marketing, which began as an advertising strategy for small companies with limited budgets and the inability to invest enough in traditional, mass media (better known in practice as ATL marketing). As far as ambush marketing is concerned, it’s a different story. We do ambush marketing in order to deceive the opponent, i.e. the competitor. The term is mostly related to sponsorships, but can be transferred to any other element of the communication / promotional mix. The intention of the original advertiser is easily ignored or even turned into its opposite, as in modern literature messages and ideologies of the writers themselves are often ignored or reversed. [Prnjat, 2015, 222] The term itself is mostly related to sponsorships, but can be transferred to any other element of the communication / promotional mix.

Guerrilla marketing has gained great popularity over the years as a marketing strategy for most companies around the world. Guerrilla marketing is very interesting because it differs from other marketing, due to its strategy of innovative and interesting concepts. In addition, it is usually used by small and medium-sized businesses because it is a relatively inexpensive way to advertise, while providing the benefits of expensive advertising. The ways and forms of advertising are limited only by the imagination of marketers and as such, are the subject of constant and sharp criticism, and to a large extent the accusations relate to deception, insult and manipulation. "In short, any place that can be used to place an advertising message is welcome. From print media, television, radio, internet, bulletin boards, billboards, posters, flyers and posters, promotional materials at the point of sale, school buses, toilet doors, urinals, to writing in the sky and banners pulled by planes. Further, "advertising texts" ("advertorials") - stories in magazines or newspapers that look like articles, but are in fact advertisements, are new types of advertising designed to go through the protective caution of people by concealing their intentions". [Brenkert, 2011, 189-190] There are numerous methods and techniques of Guerrilla Marketing, some of which are listed: Ambient marketing is placing ads in places where you least expect them and can be repeated, sensations marketing, also where it is the least expected but unrepeatable action. Viral marketing, as the name suggests, provides the effect of rapid dissemination of information, and Buzz marketing is ideal for spreading news about a new product, at no cost, e.g. by word of mouth and controversy on social networks, etc. (Table 2).

Table 2. Guerrilla marketing tools and specifics

Effect	Definition	The tool focused on that effect
Surprise	Attention is focused on the advertising message due to the surprise caused by the unconventional guerrilla action	Ambiental marketing Sensation marketing
Diffusion	Consumers voluntarily diffuse the advertising message because they are interested in guerrilla action	Viral marketing Buzz marketing
Low costs	Very low cost because the advertising message spreads in a flexible and unconventional way	Ambush marketing

Source: adapted to: [Hutter & Hoffmann, 2011, 5: 39-54.

3.    Ambush Marketing

The idea of ambush marketing is that your competitor invests a lot of money to sponsor an event (not necessarily a sporting one), such as the Olympics, the World Cup or, for example, Exit, and that you by your activities on and around the event (preferably with much less investment) in the minds and hearts (perceptions) of the visitor stay connected to that event. We distinguish between indirect and direct, predatory ambush marketing. Both types are applied in our country, both out of intent and out of ignorance. Quite often you can see local retailers sticking logos of the Olympic Games and other, big sporting events on their promotions, not maliciously, but in ignorance. Unfortunately, Serbia is too small a market for anyone to pay attention to us, so such things "can pass". Ambush marketing has been identified as a major problem, especially at major sporting events, as many of their organizations depend on large sponsorships. That is why at large sporting events there is a so-called "Sponsorship police" that prevent all forms of ambush marketing. To conclude, guerrilla marketing is a way of combining elements of the communication mix that are unusual, non-traditional and cheap, but it is generally a positive marketing practice. On the other hand, ambush marketing can always open up ethical debates and is not the purest way to achieve certain marketing goals. However, there will always be people who will equate work with war and quote the old folk saying "that everything is allowed in love and war". [Marjanović, 2018, 264]

Starčević and a group of authors [2018] state that the application of an ambush marketing strategy will be not only the subject of research for a long time, but also a practice in which the interests of two parties will oppose: companies that conduct ambush marketing and which will attract the attention of event attendants, and event organizers, as well as sponsors, who will try to prevent this practice. The intensive use of social media has opened a new field of play, which is in favour of companies that conduct ambush marketing, especially because it is about cheap media, and for the younger generations, the Internet is the main source of information and entertainment. The authors further state that there are many types of ambush marketing, some of which are indeed illegal practices (when copyright or contractual rights are infringed), but most activities do fall under free market competition. How immoral such activities are is only a matter of personal interpretation. It remains for the organizers of large events and sponsors to continue to fight against this practice by various means. However, given that the practice has been used for many years and has damaged many sponsors, it is very strange that no legal provisions have ever been passed to regulate at least certain forms of this practice that fall under unfair competition or consumer fraud, but cannot to be resolved, because a clear definition of the concept and practice does not exist anywhere in the law, and all other legal provisions have a substitute role.

Lately, big sports events have become a generator of various cultural events. Thus, during, before and after the Olympic Games in London in 2012, a kind of "Cultural Olympics" was planned, with over 12,000 cultural events. The culmination of the four-year mentioned "Cultural Olympics" is designed to point out the prominent place of Britain in the field of art, and on the eve of the Olympic Games is an art festival lasting 12 weeks [Dašić, 2013, 75; Dašić, 2016]. Six years before, in 2006, the London Olympic Games and Paralympics Games Act were passed, banning all non-sponsor marketing activities within a 200-meter radius of any Olympic facility. Huge penalties were imposed for violating the right. The rules even applied to visitors, who were not allowed to bring in any conspicuous promotional material from competing brands. [Alexandrakis, 2009] However, given the growing activity of brands on the Internet to market their product, it can be concluded that preventing marketing practices from ambush is extremely difficult. That is why the marketing departments of sports organizations in the near future will have to focus on strengthening the image of sponsors, creating unconventional solutions. Further, one of the solutions is to build a marketing alliance with the sponsor, which will clearly define its connections with the sports organization. It is believed that the use of ambush marketing is cheaper than sponsoring events, so there is a justified fear that some actors might take advantage of such an action. The budget of marketing advertising agencies is even lower today (mainly due to the use of marketing space only on social media), so there is always a fear that many companies will want to use the opportunity to improve their image in their campaign, without large financial investments. [Tomanek, 2020]

One of the earliest known examples of ambush marketing is the big argument that broke out between MasterCard and Visa during the 1992 Winter Olympics, which were held in the city of Albertville in south eastern France. After paying $20 million for the sponsorship, Visa was the official sponsor of the ’92 Winter Games credit cards. For months before the Games, Visa ran TV commercials advising American Express cardholders to leave their AmEx at home, because "the Olympic games do not take the American Express." Technically, that was true - game tickets could only be purchased with Visa credit cards. AmEx soon launched its own series of TV spots, in which the slogan was: "When you go to Spain, you will need a passport - but you do not need a Visa", a cunning reference to the upcoming Summer Games in Barcelona and a subtle dig in a rival company. Santa Monica in California was a battlefield where the world's two largest car manufacturers fought a war over the dominance of billboards. The "war" on billboards began soon after BMW hosted a rally in Wisconsin, an event that was announced in the accompanying campaign. In response to BMW's ads, Audi bought a billboard in

Conclusion

The vast majority of sports organizations cannot function normally without funding from sponsors. That is why legal protection against the unethical behaviour of competition is vital for different types of sponsorships. Prevention and immediate response to ambush marketing attempts are very important, because sponsors are extremely sensitive and carefully monitor the way athletes behave in these cases. The adoption of special laws against ambush marketing is a very useful legal support to the organizers of sports competitions. In one study [Kelly et al., 2019], which dealt with the effects of ambush advertising on the memory of sponsors, i.e. cognitive processes on which the identification of sponsors is based, it was concluded that exposure to advertising "from an ambush" has detrimental cognitive effects. When the participants in this empirical research were presented with an advertisement related to sponsorship from an ambush, they significantly diminished the memory of who is the official and legitimate sponsor with the probability of not being recognized in the future. Thus, ambush marketing is an activity that can harm the essence of sponsorship. It can take any form, but in essence, it is an attack on the exclusivity that most commercial sports partners seek and want, in a limited time. Sponsorship exclusivity is an element of sponsorship that is most often attacked by parasitic companies. The media (especially TV) play a decisive role in public opinion regarding the connection between the sponsor and the sponsored entity.

Based on the above, we can conclude that guerrilla marketing is a creative, imaginative, unexpected, unusual, aggressive, interactive, fun, cheap, inspiring, convincing, mobile and flexible way of achieving marketing goals. Guerrilla marketing uses fewer resources than ambush marketing and was created as a way of applying marketing intended for smaller market participants. In the meantime, larger participants started using it as well, because it showed the advantages in a short time. The manner of realization of the activities that make up guerrilla marketing is not in contradiction with modern principles of socially responsible business, while in the case of ambush marketing, these issues stand out. Ambush marketing can be defined as a