Jacquie Ottman's
Green marketing Blog
What Greenwash Can Learn from Snake Oil
Posted on June 13, 2011 by Jacquelyn Ottman & Mark Eisen
If we treat greenwash, we’re treating a symptom. We’re not finding and treating the problem, if indeed there is one, at least to the extent the hype would lead one to believe. We have to realize that first, the definition of greenwash is to be intentionally misleading. We don’t think that’s the case today, except in limited instances. Some history is in order.
In probably what could be thought of as the first era of greenwashing and one of the first advertising industry projects, patent …Read more...
The New Green Marketing Paradigm
Posted on May 16, 2011 by Jacquelyn Ottman
Conventional marketing is out. Green marketing and what is increasingly being called “sustainable branding” is in. According to the new rules of green marketing, effectively addressing the needs of consumers with a heightened environmental and social consciousness cannot be achieved with the same assumptions and formulae that guided consumer marketing since the postwar era. Times have changed. A new paradigm has emerged requiring new strategies with a holistic point of view and eco-innovative product and service offering.
Historically, marketers developed products that met consumers’ needs at affordable prices and then communicated the benefits of their brands in a memorable …Read more...
20 New Rules of Green Marketing. 20 Free Books. 20 Chances to Win
Posted on January 22, 2011 by Jacquelyn Ottman
Green Marketers, Start your EVs. My new book, The New Rules of Green Marketing (Berrett-Koehler - U.S., Greenleaf Publishing - U.K. February 2011, $21.95, 252 pp.) officially launched on February 7 and is now on real and virtual shelves in bookstores and online booksellers.
Win a Free Copy. To help celebrate, each business day from February 7 until March 7 I will blog one of the 20 new rules described in the book and will give away one FREE signed copy to a lucky winner. Everyone …Read more...
Green Marketing 3.0 Can Re-ignite Interest in Green
Posted on November 15, 2010 by guest blogger, Jeff Dubin
Rumors of green’s demise are being greatly exaggerated. In this year of fiery political passions, the word “revolt” is in the air. However, I think Ad Age inhaled a whiff of the zeitgeist and incorrectly applied the term to consumers supposedly cooling in their ardor for green products. “Has Green Stopped Giving? Seeds of Consumers Revolt Sprouting Against Some Environmentally Friendly Product Lines” trumpets the headline of a recent Ad Age article. The author quotes Timothy Kenyon, director of GfK Roper’s Green Gauge study who more judiciously describes the current situation as “green fatigue.” This may be closer to …Read more...
A Better Approach to Tackling Greenwashing Than Pointing Fingers
Posted on November 14, 2010 by Jacquelyn Ottman
I have been doing a lot of finger-pointing of late in response to Terrachoice’s latest 2010 Sins of Greenwashing “Home and Family Edition”. Two wrongs don’t make a right. So, let me clarify my position—and in keeping with my normal positive self, offer some concrete suggestions for moving the industry forward.
Rather than analyzing green marketing claims as they appear on the shelf and concluding there’s either something ill-intended about the marketers’ making them (however, clumsily tongue in cheek), or that greenwashing is nearly impossible to avoid, let’s start by facing the fact that determining what exactly can be claimed …Read more...
Terrachoice’s Sins of Greenwashing Report—Time for Industry Self-Regulation?
Posted on November 08, 2010 by Jacquelyn Ottman
Most of you are familiar with Terrachoice’s “Seven Sins of Greenwashing” report. On a webinar aired in late October, CEO Scott McDougall admitted that his firm never intended to be malicious in their use of the term, “sins”. He believes that most of the “sins” of greenwashing being committed today are really not sins at all, but rather, inadvertent missteps.
Call me literal, or not a fan of hyperbole, but I believe that calling, in effect, otherwise well-intended marketers “sinners”, and setting the bar too high …Read more...
Green Marketing Myopia and the SunChips “Snacklash”
Posted on October 27, 2010 by Jacquie Ottman & Mark Eisen
Many marketing experts have weighed in on what they believe to be the reasons for the current backlash against SunChips’s new compostable chip package: excess noise. If you somehow missed it, consumers complained so loudly about the snack food’s new environmentally preferable but noisy corn-based bag that the brand reverted to the old packaging for most of its line. Before we blame consumers once again for not sacrificing a little inconvenience for the sake of the planet, let’s take a step back and understand what really is to …Read more...
EPA’s Role in Advancing Sustainable Products—and You
Posted on September 23, 2010 by Jacquelyn Ottman
According to a new entry in the Federal Register, EPA is now soliciting individual stakeholder input regarding the Agency’s role in the “green” or sustainable products movement. The Agency will consider the information gathered from the Federal Register notice as well as from other sources as it works to define its role and develop a strategy that identifies how EPA can make a meaningful contribution to the development, manufacture, designation, and use of sustainable products.
This represents an important opportunity for those of us in the green marketing world to move …Read more...
Creating the Virtuous Cycle: Integrating Online and Offline Green Marketing
Posted on July 20, 2010 by Jacquelyn Ottman
This is a guest blog post by Paul Hannam.
Conscious consumers are shifting to the web even more rapidly than many other market segments. According to a report in early 2010 from Burst Media, the internet is the number one source of product information for green consumers. Almost 40% of this group prefers the web in contrast to the TV, in second place, at only 18%. All businesses and organizations that want to engage with these consumers need to …Read more...
Stand By Your Cause: What Marketers Can Learn From Dawn’s Involvement In The Gulf Oil Spill
Posted on July 12, 2010 by Jacquelyn Ottman
Long marketed by Procter & Gamble as an “effective yet gentle” way to keep dishes free from even the greasiest of grease, Dawn dishwashing liquid was widely publicized during the Exxon-Valdez oil spill in 1989 as an ideal way to remove residue from afflicted bird and mammal species.
Fast forward to mid-April 2010, just days before the 40th anniversary celebration of Earth Day. P&G decided to create awareness for its 30-year long support of bird rescue groups by launching a new installment to a campaign begun last …Read more...
To Sell Green, Look Beyond the Planet
Posted on March 11, 2010 by Jacquelyn Ottman
This past Tuesday I opened my morning New York Times and decided one of my favorite columnists, Jane E. Brody, should be selling green. Her article (which I paraphrase in tribute here), entitled, To Keep Moving, Look Beyond the Physical, describes various motivators to get people to exercise beyond the specific benefits of the exercise itself. Borrowing the motivational approach often used by commecial marketers— an “emotional hook that creates positive meaningful expectations of how exercise can enhance people’s lives, a way to feel better,” she describes such non-health motivators as enjoying nature on an early morning walk, using …Read more...
A Smart New Way to Segment Green Consumers
Posted on February 06, 2010 by Jacquelyn Ottman
When you target customers, it helps to know if they’re “dark green”, “light green” or “basic brown” in their attitudes, but, with so many green issues, products, and labels out there, it may be more relevant to your branding and communications to understand their personal green interests.
Ask: To which environmental organizations do members of our target audience belong (The Appalachian Mountain Club or Greenpeace)? Which types of vacations do they take (hiking or the beach)? Which environmental magazines and websites do they read or visit? (Sierra or Animal Fair?) Which types of products do they buy? (green fashions or …Read more...
Underscore Health Benefits to Add Relevance to Green Marketing Messages
Posted on January 13, 2010 by Jacquelyn Ottman
As I have said numerous times over the years, the number one reason why consumers buy greener products is not to “save the planet” but to save their own health. AFM understands this well—and puts their understanding of this green marketing fundamental to work in two ads that do a great job of underscoring the health benefits of their line of Safecoat paint.
One ad features 16 buckets of paint lined up in a row. Fifteen of the buckets are painted red and sport descriptive labels touting benefits including “long lasting”, …Read more...
When it Comes to Marketing Green Appliances, Silence is Golden
Posted on January 11, 2010 by Jacquelyn Ottman
Ads for Bosch’s super quiet, high performance appliances make a point about doing green marketing right loud and clear: focus on the benefits most relevant to consumers.
As I discuss at more length in my soon-to-be-published book, “Consumers buy products to meet basic needs, not (primarily) to save the planet.” Said another way, consumers walk into the store with their, well, consumer caps on, not citizen ones.
Commercials for Bosch’s super-energy efficient appliances focus on how quiet they are, with secondary emphasis on their environmentally preferable attributes. In one ad that I discussed in the book, a gentle deer walking …Read more...
Opportunities for Marketing to the Green Consumer
Posted on January 09, 2010 by Jacquelyn Ottman
Consumers buy over $200 billion of natural personal care and cleaning products, organic produce, hybrid cars, fair trade coffee, compostable plates and cups, and other green products and services.
Please join me on February 4, 2010 (in New York City) for Opportunities to Market to the Green Consumer. Network with members of the Columbia Business School Alumni Club and other senior marketing professionals from New York. Listen to green marketing practitioners from HSBC, Ozocar and Sundance Channel talk about opportunities to build green brands, innovate new products and services, and contribute to the bottomline. I’ll be moderating the panel and …Read more...
