can sustainability thinking help you be a better marketer

Can sustainability be a route to becoming a

better marketer?

What is the job of marketing?

“Marketing people like to say that a product is more than a physical object. There is a story a promise - that’s what the brand represents.

Sometimes this story is true and sometimes unfortunately it is not. The process of marketing is to uncover and coax out a story that is buried inside the product.

What happens next is a battery of focus groups, ethnographies and brainscans to uncover what the consumer wishes the product really was.Then the marketing budget is spent telling lies about the product”

Adding some sheen?

Baked In by Alex Bogusky and John Winsor

What is the job of sustainable

marketing?

Adding some green

sheen?

Green sheen is definitely not the answer!

An evolutionary perspective on the new challenges of

marketing...

and how sustainability thinking can

overcome these challenges

what works - has changed

what is possible - has changed

what people want - has changed

platform rules characters

the rulesthe playersthe platform

In ads we trust

what works has changed

Beliefthatcompaniesgenerallytellthetruthinadshasfallendownfrom13%tojust6%2002to2006

Advertising resistance

Thebrandbubble­JohnGerzemaandEdLebar

Source: nVision ResearchBase: 11,000 aged 15+ / 5,000 aged 16-64 (Nordics), 2006

“Advertising does not reflect my life nowadays”% who agree / strongly agree, by age within country

Media monopoly

Can’t get my message across

what works has changed

Source: Jupiter/Merrill Lynch/Deloitte State of Media 2007, Big Six Study 2007 (US/Germany)

TVviewing(UK.)NoofprogrammesintheUKthatreachedover15million?

1999–1772006–22007–0Barbdata

Source: nVision researchBase: 9000 internet users aged 15+

Simultaneous TV watching & internet use

Trust and respect in

brands

Falling trust and respect

what works has changed

TheHenleycentreintheUKhasrecordedthatsince1999the17largesticonicbrandshaveshowna16%declineinconsumerTRUST

Y&Rresearchfrom2008showsa50%dropinTRUSTinthelast9years

Engagement

Build trust and respect

Behaviour - the company is the message

Fromlossoftrusttosustainabilitychampions

Trustismoreimportanttousthanithaseverbeen.GlobalchiefmarketingofSicerMcDonalds

Sustainability thinking can help...

Digital transparency

Hide behind the brand

what’s possible has changed

what’s possible has

changed

Brand directed media

People directed media

what’s possible has changed

Product di≠erentiation

Commoditisation

Branddifferentiationdecline­40outof46categoriesshowedadeclineinabilitytodifferentiatebasedonCopernicusbrandmetrics

Di≠erentiation

Reputation risk/opportunity

Open dialogue

Sustainability thinking can help...

what people want has changed

Inhumancompanies

Human companies

“A business has a voice. You can usually hear it -- authentic or unauthentic -- most obviously and transparently, on its Web site. Even before the last graphic finishes downloading, you can usually tell if the company speaks with passion, if it’s lost or uninterested.

The Cluetrain Manifesto - Rick Levine, Christopher Locke, Doc Searls, and David Weinberger.

Authenticity seeking

Brand identity

what people want has changed

40%ofEuropeansnowclaimthattheyactivelytryto“supportsmallbrandsorproducerswheneverIcan”accordingtonVisionResearch.

AegisMediaresearch

Vision

Meeting short term needs

Fitting with long term

Values

what people want has changed

“In‘BuiltToLast’,JerryPorrasandMichaelCollinsdemonstratethat–inthemediumandlongerterm–purpose‐drivenbusinessesoutperformbusinesseswithsimilarassetbases,fromsimilarlocaEons,ofsimilarage,etc.byalargemargin.”MarkEarls,HERD

“Themarketforsomethingtobelieveinisinfinite”HughMacCleod

Thebrandbubble­JohnGerzemaandEdLebar

Relevance - Empathy

Authenticity

Leadership

Sustainability thinking can help...

Using sustainability to answer the new marketing challenges means re-thinking corporate structures

Marketing

Sustainability

Inside out Outside in

The lines become blurred

“Brand Ecosystem”

EmployeesSuppliers Customers

MarketingOperations

ProductHR

CSR

Every part of your business is under scrutiny

But when imbued with sustainability thinking, every part can be brand building

Patagonia - just logistics?

Digital transparency

16 products

Interactive

Open discussionWe believe it’s important for our customers to know the true environmental and social impact of a garment they purchase.

“Casey Sheahan, CEO, Patagonia

Zappos – just human resources?

$2000 to quit

random acts of kindness

To us, customer service isn't just a department -- it is the entire company.

10 core values

$1.2 billion

employees in ads

“

Nike greenxchange – just product development?

open-source

collaborative

400 patents shared

innovation communities

Our hope is this will unleash new innovation to help solve current obstacles to sustainability issues“

Mark Parker, Nike CEO

Dole - just supply chain management?

traceability

digital transparency

3-digit farm code

It's not enough for the customer to love your product. They have to love your process as well.“

The Cluetrain Manifesto

25+ farms

carbon neutral

educate and engage

leadership on big issues

News Corp – just corporate comms?

drives a hybrid

Imagine if we succeed in inspiring our audiences to reduce their own impacts on climate change by just 1 per cent. That would be like turning the state of California off for almost two months.

“Rupert Murdoch, CEO News Corp

Danone Grameen - just CSR?

6 ¢

multinational social business

partnership

1,600 new jobs

new marketA great opportunity to make progress and take another huge step towards fulfilling our mission: to bring health through food to as many people as possible.

“Franck Riboud, CEO Groupe Danone

Pepsi Refresh – beyond brand communications?

1155 ideas this month

6 categories

$5,000 - $250,000

$25 million

We decided that this year it was time for the brand to actually go within culture and actually move something forward, so that it was actually getting engaged with consumers.

Frank Cooper, CCEO, PepsiCo

“

“Brand Ecosystem”

EmployeesSuppliers Customers

MarketingOperations

ProductHR

CSR

Every part of your business is under scrutiny

But when imbued with sustainability thinking, every part can be brand building

The future belongs to a very different kind of person with a very different kind of mind – creators and empathizers, pattern recognizers and meaning makers.

“

Daniel H. Pink