Sustainable marketing is the process of engaging and communicating with customers in a way that considers and minimises the impact of the marketing activity on the environment.
Sustainable marketing looks beyond the immediate needs of the business and its customers and balances the long-term interests of society. Importantly, sustainable marketing practices can still focus on achieving business goals but also leans towards decisions that limit environmental impact.
Some of the most effective marketing practices have built in sustainability – bonus! Social media and digital advertising are two such channels which inherently create no waste and are efficient in their delivery. Digital marketing has the environmental plus of being paperless, but where printing has been deemed necessary, there are still sustainable options, like printing on recycled paper, sourcing locally and using environmentally responsible and eco-conscious suppliers.
7 Effective Yet Sustainable Marketing Options
Here’s our favourite green marketing channels:
- Social media advertising
- Digital display advertising
- Search engine advertising
- Email marketing
- Outdoor advertising
- Email newsletters
- Re-usable and recyclable promotional items
- Face-to-face marketing
But why should you even bother worrying about whether your marketing practices are sustainable? Why shouldn’t you just go on rolling out your marketing in any form that will reach the most customers?
The Importance of Sustainable Marketing
Apart from the fact that we all need to do our bit to help the environment, the climate crisis is now increasingly impacting purchase decisions. A recent report from Nielsen linked sustainability claims to sales, with products with certain sustainability attributes outperforming the growth rate of total products in their respective categories.
The rise of green marketing which focuses on promoting products’ environmental benefits is undoubtedly driving growth for brands that take this path. Products claim to be eco-friendly, low-energy, carbon neutral, non-toxic, recycled, ethically sourced, fair trade and chemical free. And it can impact sales in a big way.
If your product is not super green, you can always seek other ways to join the green movement. Aligning your brand with an environmental cause can have a big payoff especially with certain target audiences – Forbes reports 70% of millennials will pay more for brands that support a cause they care about.
But there’s no point in marketing your product’s green credentials or supporting a green cause if you aren’t being green in the way you conduct your marketing…today’s savvy customers will smell a rat, you’ll come off as completely inauthentic and any uplift that may have come will soon disappear.
If you do your own marketing, make sure you consider your choices carefully when determining your marketing activities. If you’re outsourcing your marketing, make sure you’re choosing an agency that has strong green credentials. You’ll be back at square one if your production processes are inefficient.
Cuckoo’s Environmental Policy
We acknowledge the global issue of climate change and our responsibility to deliver projects with a minimal impact on the environment. We adopt an environmentally sustainable approach in all areas of our business, recognising situations where methods, procedures or products are detrimental to the environment and then aiming to rectify these situations.
We’re committed to continually assessing the company’s environmental sustainability and adopting new ways to decrease our impact on the environment.
We approach all areas of business to first reduce, then what cannot be reduced, reused, then what cannot be reused, recycled, then what cannot be recycled, offset.
We have undertaken a number of steps to ensure we minimise our environmental impact:
- Our office is a low carbon site.
- We encourage employees to work from home.
- We offset all of our air travel.
- We offset our business vehicle impact.
- We offset the residual emissions of our office.
- We offer a carbon neutral event process to our clients.
- We offer eco-friendly printing options.
Sustainable marketing can earn you the trust and loyalty of customers. And you can sleep better knowing you’re doing the right thing for the future of the planet. Get in touch if you’d like help to reduce the impact of your marketing on the environment.