Here's a copy of our article in this week's Reno News & Review
- "The Growth Of Green Marketing": Today’s consumers are
increasingly socially conscious, with a growing concern to know if
companies honestly treat employees fairly while doing their part to
protect and save the environment. Brand values like social
responsibility, benefit to the community, and “being green” are at
the top of more shopping lists than ever. Not unsurprisingly,
enthusiasts of technology are leading the way. The recently
published
Forrester study titled
Making The Case For Environmentally And Socially Responsible
Consumer Products, a survey of over 5,400 U.S. adults were
asked about their purchasing habits between April and May of 2008.
Amazingly, 65% of those polled consumers confirmed they were
“concerned about the environment or global warming.” This trend is
up nearly 23% from a November 2007 study, which found that 53%
percent of consumers were concerned about sustainability. In short
order, business has been quick to leverage this social trending
with products and marketing offers – some more successfully than
others. Today’s “green marketing” offers a unique set of
challenges; the least of which is a prevalent lack of standards for
identifying what it actually means to be a “green” product or
company. In combination with the increase in consumer awareness,
marketers are seeing a growing demand for eco-labeling, “green”
advertising and the overall importance of reporting on
sustainability and renewable energy oriented products and projects.
This obviously has created a glut of misguided opportunities to
nearly everything to be positioned as being “green”, from a minor
packaging change to actual services and products that truly reduce
energy and waste. As so many new and old companies jump on the “do
good” bandwagon, factions of green marketing have arisen — cause
marketing, cause-related marketing, cause branding, conscious
marketing, social good marketing and many other new ways of
positioning brands within this growing market sector. What binds
this growing set of terms is simple: establishing your marketing
efforts in a way that’s truly responsible. Often this can be
misunderstood to mean aligning tactics with a cause, but it is
certainly not limited to that description. It may also mean the
responsible use of funds, reducing unnecessary print marketing
materials, or not deploying a controversial ad that might benefit
the company financially. Taking this effort a bit further might be
easiest to simply call it “Ethical Marketing”. This trending
presents a unique challenge to green marketers like ourselves as
products and messages become much more common, often resulting in
great confusion in the marketplace. “Consumers do not really
understand a lot about these issues, and there’s a lot of confusion
out there,” says Jacquelyn Ottman (founder of J. Ottman Consulting
and author of Green Marketing: Opportunity for Innovation.)
Advantageous marketers can take advantage of this confusion by
intentionally making false or exaggerated claims to being “green” –
what we now know as “green washing”.
Mintel Reports completed a recent
study noting that approximately 12% of consumers in the U.S. can be
identified as “True Greens” – individuals who seek-out and
regularly purchase so-called “green products”. With them, 68% can
be thought of as “Light Greens” – those who buy green on occasion.
“What chief marketing officers are always looking for is touch
points with consumers, and this is just a big, big, big touch point
that’s not being served,” says Mintel Research Director David
Lockwood. “All the corporate executives that we talk to are
extremely convinced that being able to make some sort of strong
case about the environment is going to work down to their bottom
line. Given the obvious social and economic demand, how can
companies honestly take advantage of today’s consciousness toward
sustainability, renewable energy and ecology? I believe you have to
do three things: Be Genuine, Educate Customers, and Offer
Participation. Being genuine simply means that you are doing what
you claim in your green marketing campaign – and ensuring your
business policies are consistent with your claim. Both of these
elements must be met to establish valid credentials that allow the
green campaign to succeed. Educating customers is not simply
letting the public know what you’re doing to protect the
environment, but more importantly, letting them know why it
matters. If education is not reason oriented for your target
market, you’ll encounter a general “so what” response that will
dash bottom-line results from the campaign. Providing your
customers with the opportunity to participate enables you to
personalize your green initiatives — often by enabling the customer
to take part in truly positive environmental action. The lesson
here is obvious and simple: you have to “walk the talk” and
actually implement green policies and act in environmentally
friendly ways for green marketing to work. If you do, you’ll create
a powerful selling point with those who are environmentally and
socially conscious and want to act to make the world a better place
— a market that’s growing exponentially today. “Green marketing”
isn’t merely a catchphrase; it’s a marketing strategy that can help
you get more customers and make more money. As in any marketing
effort — the challenge is doing it right the first time.
