Funeral social image
transparency vs opacity

By Vicente Díaz Pedraza, Economist and Marketing Advisor, Spain

This article was published in spanish funeral magazine “Revista Funeraria” no 174

Public scrutiny increases its intensity day by day and invites all social agents to be increasingly transparent. The increase in levels of transparency is a direct consequence of hyperconnectivity and the continuous interaction that we maintain with our environment through new technologies and social networks. This volume of information means that the companies that make up a sector can lose much of the control they can exercise over their individual and overall reputation. Earning the trust of society is vital for a good image.

One of the big problems that a sector faces is the lack of credibility that the bad behavior of some agents establishes among a large segment of public opinion. If, in addition, there is a high degree of opacity in that sector, the situation becomes more complicated. The requirements regarding levels of transparency will continue to increase in society, and gaining and maintaining their trust is an essential element to achieving a good image and recognition.

Transparency of the funeral sector

The Spanish funeral sector has evolved in recent years towards greater transparency, professionalization and improvement in the quality of its services and products in harmony with society. Even so, there continues to be a deficit of social recognition, which prevents public opinion from fully internalizing the important mission that the funeral sector has. In recent years things are changing for the better and at a good pace. The balance between negative and positive news is tilting in favor of the latter in a noticeable way, thanks to the actions of national associations and the improvement of business behavior.

In the funeral sector, not many years ago, there was a latent need to have associations that expressed, communicated and defended the interests of the entire profession before public and private organizations, which were framed in an environment of lawful competition and a spirit of collaboration and professional ethics that developed in its members a great sense of belonging.

This business and professional feeling of belonging to a sector makes it easier to achieve the common objective of improving the image that public opinion has of their activity. In this sense, it is important to manage publicity, one of the modalities of communication in marketing and which constitutes a pending issue in the funeral sector.

What is advertising?

The word publicity is an English word that should not be translated as advertising but as notoriety or as a technique that favors it. This term refers to communication in which the apparent sender is not a specific company or a specific sector, but normally a journalist who considers that some topic related to the company or the sector may be of interest to his readers, viewers or listeners. It would be all the information that appears on social media, not as paid advertisements, but as comments, reports, reviews, etc.

Advertising can undoubtedly be both positive and negative, given that it is issued by an independent third party. Efforts must then be made to ensure that positive information that may be favorable and of interest to journalists reaches them as easily and quickly as possible. What happened in the funeral sector is that in practically all cases only negative information arrived. The profession was only in the news when there was talk of illegalities and lack of scruples.

There was a clear deficit in the transmission of positive news that had to be covered and this situation of negativity did not correspond to the important social function that funeral activity plays. Along those lines, we had to work by communicating to the media all the investment efforts in facilities and vehicles, in professional training and education in cultural, religious and social adaptation. Fortunately, this has been and is being done well in recent years.

ESG Commitment

The ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance) commitment has been established in the funeral sector and in the companies that comprise it, moving towards sustainability and guaranteeing that their operations and development are respectful of the environment, social rights and goodwill governance.

The funeral sector has also experienced a fundamental development brought about, on this occasion, only by private initiative. There is no sectoral information from any public organization that offers a systematic and updated analysis in detail and that specifies the main quantitative and qualitative aspects that define its recent evolution. This gap has been filled by the National Association of Funeral Services Panasef. It is fair to recognize the effort made in recent years that has been materialized with publications and rigorous studies.

When public opinion becomes accustomed to a high level of corporate transparency in a sector, its interest in the quality of its products and services increases. The public is be able to differentiate which companies act in an ethical and responsible manner and will censure and suspect all those that do not. Society has never had more power than now to make companies behave responsibly, and companies have never had a better situation to turn their good behavior into a competitive advantage. The message is very clear: better behavior means better image and social recognition.

October 8, 2023 Vicente Luis Díaz Pedraza, Economist and Marketing Advisor, friend and great collaborator of Revista Funeraria since 2000, died in Madrid at the age of 62 after a long illness. We obtained permission to reprint shortly before his passing. We will remember him as an expert in the funeral and insurance sector with great capacity for deep analysis of the various aspects of the funeral sector and its current events, of which he was always up to date. We are sure that his contribution to the improvement of the sector will endure.

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