photo credit: rengel134                       

What a difference a word makes. With news out of Washington on the waffling on the Alternative Energy front, it occurred to me how much further this effort might be moving along if we weren’t dealing with the term “alternative” as in just another possible way instead of the most intelligent way to create new and reliable sources to power our future.

 Maybe the new term, which I offer up gratis to all of you, should be Absolutely Necessary Energy, or even Can’t Live Without It Energy. Then maybe a sound energy policy would already be in place and people would understand that we can’t live without it.

 As a marketer, I know how we label something has a profound effect on its acceptance. I find it incredible that with all our brilliant sunshine shining down every day and all our abundant wind blowing freely, instead of being captured and harnessed, we’re still dragging our feet on getting out and demanding a sane, inexhaustible and clean supply to power our nation. The jobs it would create and the national security this would engender, not to mention the cleaning of our air and water supply, would be the greatest gift this or any Administration could give our country and the world. 

 So let’s change the name and change our direction on this or someday the future generations will look back on us and shake their heads in disbelief.  

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It’s easy to point your finger at Coca-Cola’s environmental effort and use your middle finger instead of your index finger. But when one of the world’s largest fillers of landfills, that’s where 75% of all Coke bottles end up, adopts the PlantBottle, a more eco-friendly bottle made in part from sugar cane and molasses, we should all drink to that. 

This move alone doesn’t make Coke a green champion but it certainly will help make them less of a culprit. And all that green money they’ll spend to promote it will help to get the environmental message out to a much broader segment of the population. We should all hope this will start a trend in the beverage world and their competition will follow, as they usually do. Since we started writing the Green Marketing Blog, our hope was to help marketers take their messages and their products more mainstream so the green world becomes the everyday and not the alternative world. 

A marketing professor interviewed for this article said, “Anything you wrap in green is going to sell.” I don’t agree. Green, as we’ve said many times before, needs to make sense if it’s going to be viable for the long haul.  If not, it will stay on the fringes and that’s not where the real change takes place. 

Irv

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Sorry Kermit, according to the Federal Trade Commission, it’s too easy being green.  And they’re going to do something about it (sound of foot stomping).  This week at a hearing entitled just that,  “It’s too easy being green,” the House subcommittee on commerce, trade and consumer protection presented a concise summary about environmentally – themed marketing claims and suggested that the rules get “significantly tougher” in coming years.

Well, it’s about time. Green has to mean something more than pretty little pictures of forests and flowers on the bottle of your shampoo.  When launching a truly organic (and biodynamic) personal care product for a client, I got to know some of the dirty little secrets of this unregulated field. Did you know that when you see claims like “70% organic” blazoned across the label of a certain shampoo by certain manufacturer, most of the “organic” they are talking about is the water in their product?  Is that misleading or what? Hair washing and greenwashing in one bottle. 

I am happy that new rules are being structured.  The Canadians did it a long time ago. And that’s good news for start-ups that tend to lean more green than the bigger guys.  If we want green to be more than a fad, consumers of all shades of green need to have confidence in the products and services they buy.  And when they do, watch your green brand turn into gold.    

– Carolyn    

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Take heart green-preneurs, there’s a green light ahead.  According to a recent Advertising Age headline, “Green-Marketing Revolution Defies Economic Downturn: Sustainable-Product Sales Rise as Eco-friendliness Goes Mainstream and Value Players Join the Trend.”  That’s proof that even in a harsh economy; healthier, smarter and safer products have meaning to consumers.  That’s not just because consumers have more planet consciousness, that’s because they have more personal involvement.  They want products that are better for themselves and their families — and the planet too.

That’s the true green message that wants to be told. Organic food equals better food, tastier food, fresher food.  Eco- cleaning products are safer for your kids and home.  Zero VOC paints are not only beautiful to look at but beautiful to live with. They don’t off-gas toxins into your inner environment.  In the time of Swine flu, e-coli hamburgers and scary peanut butter, green products need to make the case that they’re better products. 

For instance, for a solar client we recommended as their company tag line, “We Bring Solar Down To Earth.”  That said two things.  Number one, they harnessed the sun.  Number two and even more important, they have made solar practical, economical, every day and something for everyone, not just off-the-gridders.

What does that mean to you?  Simple. Get relevant.  Communicate your reason for being. What you do and what you do better. Make your case personal and close-in. When you’ve educated all of us in simple, down-to-earth terms, than you create a relationship not just a customer.  You’ve done something for them, instead of just selling something to them.

What are you doing to get relevant?  We want to know.  Really.

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Word of mouth has always been the most effective form of marketing and advertising. Today it’s word of mouse. Never before has there been a more potent opportunity to track, listen to and communicate with green consumers. Even more amazing there are legions of Influencers out there who are speaking about what you make and what you do.

Are you listening in? Monitoring their blog? And their tweets on Twitter? If you’re not, you should be. Once you know what they’re thinking and what they’re saying you can reach out to them. If it’s positive, give them heartfelt thanks and appreciate their efforts on your behalf. If it’s negative, communicate with them and let them know you appreciate their concerns and are working to rectify them. Word of mouse is a powerful thing.

To prove the point, just a couple of weeks ago two Domino’s pizza employees posted a video on You Tube of them spitting in a pizza (and doing other nasty things). The ripples went out faster than a case of swine flu. Within hours, thousands and thousands of people downloaded that video which put the international pizza delivery chain in crisis. Imagine that. That’s how fast a situation can be spread by the click of a mouse.

On a more positive note, Blendtec, a company that makes super duper blenders at a super duper price ($399.00 and up), created an “extreme blending” video series called “Will it Blend?” and posted it on video-sharing sites like You Tube. The first five videos cost $50.00 to make. Imagine that.

One particular video featured a bright and shiny new iPod being pulverized by a well used Blendtec blender. When the company posted a link on Digg after setting up the video on their site, it spread like wildfire which soon led to appearances on The Today Show and The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. Soon the views for Blendtec’s video series reached 60 million and increased their sales by 20%.

As some traditional media loses its audience and its clout, social media is the way to go. It’s not only cost effective, its brand effective. It’s a new world out there, use it or lose it.

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