Sustainable Marketing was once thought to be a fad, only supported by a minority of people including vegan consumers, environment-focused NGOs, and activists. Nowadays, everything has changed. Over the last few years, we have been seeing these issues regularly discussed by professionals and academics in many public forums. These external trends have led multinational corporations to change their business practices and reassess the value chains. Advertisements focusing on sustainability are becoming more prevalent, resulting in new trends in communications, along with contemporary challenges for marketers to overcome right away.
1. Define sustainable marketing with 3 Pillars: People, Planet, and Profit
“Marketing strategies driven by sustainability focus on meeting the consumers’ current needs without spoiling future generations’ prosperity.”
Marketing is satisfying customers’ needs and wants and building a profitable long-term relationship. First, let’s try to define what marketing is. And again, marketing is not advertising anymore (please read my previous blog on this).
Sustainable marketing goes beyond that. Marketing strategies driven by sustainability focus on meeting the consumers’ current needs without spoiling future generations’ prosperity. Sustainable Marketing refers to the triple bottom line (TBL) thinking in which a sustainable business guarantees the long-term pursuit of 3 interconnected dimensions: Planet, People, and Profit.
• Planet: this represents the environmental impact of a business’s activities. It considers factors like resource and energy consumption, waste management, green supply chain, etc.
• People: this focuses on the impact that a company has on society’s well-being. This requires a commitment to ethical labor practices, human rights, diversity and inclusion (which can be seen on the company’s website).
• Profit: this dimension acknowledges the important role of the firm’s financial viability over a long period.
In general, sustainability-driven marketing is no longer a short-term thinking to secure your business’s success, it has become the priority to many global corporations due to the current environmental and social pressures.
Sustainable Marketing is not Green Marketing. It’s broader than that!
Sustainable marketing is broader than green marketing, don’t get confused. Sustainable marketing is a holistic approach, considering the environment (green), social and economic impacts of a brand’s activities. It’s a long-term commitment that has to be sustained by the brand, calling for its transparency in communicating how its business practices protect the planet, and build social well-being while remaining profitable.
On the other hand, green marketing primarily focuses on promoting products, services, or environmentally friendly practices. This is where most of us find it confusing to decide which type of marketing should be prioritized. Some go for green marketing and get themselves involved in ‘greenwashing’ (read more below), using misleading claims to appear eco-friendly to the public without taking responsible actions.
Thus, it depends on your brand’s values and goals to decide which strategy is the most appropriate. If you’re genuinely committed to sustainability and want to make a positive impact on our planet, Sustainable Marketing is the better choice. However, if you’re just looking for a quick way to appeal to eco-conscious consumers, Green Marketing might be tempting, but be cautious of greenwashing.
2. Sustainable Marketing Strategy – A Transformation of 4Ps in Marketing
Planning A Sustainable Product Strategy
The goal of building a sustainable product is to tackle three key challenges: mitigating climate change, improving the well-being of communities, and ensuring the responsible and efficient use of natural resources.
‘Sustainable Marketing: How to Drive Profits with Purpose‘ by Carvill, Butler, and Evans (2021)
As Sustainable Marketing revolves around 3 pillars: people, planet, and profit, sustainability-driven product strategy has transformed to deal with 3 contemporary problems: climate change, poverty, and the scarcity of natural resources.
1. Climate Change
• Material Selection: a sustainable product should minimize its impact on the environment throughout its lifecycle, commencing with material selection such as using recycled, renewable materials.
• Efficient energy consumption: this factor requires marketers to rethink their product concepts, which not only satisfy consumers’ needs but also minimize the amount of gas emissions from the entire value chain, from sourcing the ingredients to in-house production, and finally distribution.
• Pollution control: the company should employ cleaner production processes, actively engage in environmental protection initiatives, etc.
2. Poverty
• Fair labor practices: the company should pursue fair labor practices, ensuring safe working conditions, and respect for worker rights. The manufacturing process of the products should be 100% safe.
• Local communities: by sourcing materials locally and ethically, and investing money in local infrastructure, sustainable businesses can create new thousand jobs for underprivileged individuals.
3. Natural resources depletion
As natural resources are scarce, a sustainable product should be financially viable and contribute to long-term economic growth. This includes a restricted control of resources used during the product lifecycle, a guarantee of the product’s durability and longevity, and a circular system where products are recycled and reused at the end of their life to create new economic opportunities.
New Pricing Strategies
Pricing sustainable products can be tricky. While production costs tend to be higher due to ethical sourcing and eco-friendly processes, consumers might not always be willing to pay more. Therefore, charging consumers nowadays should go along with a transparent explanation.
Prices cannot be set alone anymore. It calls for more informative communications, showing consumers the long-term benefits of the products such as durability, environmental friendliness, etc.
Finally, cost reduction strategies through innovation should be taken into account as they can make sustainable products more accessible to a wider range of audience.
Promoting Sustainability: Avoid ‘Greenwashing’
The adoption of sustainable product and pricing strategies means that marketers are required to communicate more transparently to their stakeholders. Marketing communications are no longer a linear interaction. In contrast, communicating sustainability requires collaboration and partnerships with green NGOs, experts, and digital influencers to build trust and credibility.
Marketers nowadays are encouraged to open communication with their stakeholders, addressing concerns and getting feedback on product development and sustainable marketing strategies.
It is vital to avoid greenwashing in your communications as consumers’ attitudes towards claims on environmental impacts have been negative for the last couple of years. People don’t trust what the brand tells them about its sustainability because they fear they will be misled and manipulated by false information.
Thus, brands should be authentic and responsible for what they say to consumers, this means that all claims have to be backed up with verified evidence, trustworthy data, and even certifications.
Building A Sustainable ‘Place’ System
Place extends beyond physical stores and distribution channels. It’s the entire chain your product interacts with, from sourcing to disposal. Let’s begin the process by partnering for responsible practices, designing eco-friendly spaces, and then being transparent about the distribution’s footprint.
* I’ve learned the above strategy from different sources, among which I highly recommend ‘Sustainable Marketing: How to Drive Profits with Purpose’ if you want to learn more about Sustainable Marketing Strategy. You can buy it at:
3. Sustainable marketing communications trends in 2024
Media decarbonization for sustainability communications
For the last couple of years, ‘media decarbonization’ has become an evolving area with increasing importance in responsible marketing practices. In short, it refers to the efforts to reduce the carbon footprint of media activities used in marketing communications campaigns. This also means that marketers and media planners nowadays should optimize their creative assets and delivery by choosing media with low energy consumption and waste.
Media decarbonization has resulted in the application of many digital technologies including augmented, virtual reality marketing, and other new-born digital tools. This is why we’ve seen an increasing amount of budget allocated to digital advertising over the last decade. Digital ad spending is anticipated to reach $0.67 billion in 2024, which is equivalent to an 11.9% compound annual growth rate (CAGR).
Transparency becomes the priority in communicating sustainability commitment
Under climate concerns and greenwashing skepticism, transparency has become the cornerstone of authentic and effective sustainable marketing. Modern consumers are increasingly wary of false claims, and regulators are tightening the reins on misleading practices.
A study conducted by consultancy Sensu Insight in 2022 has pointed out that nearly 30% of interviewees think that sustainability-focused communications are exaggerated and lack evidence. To further worsen the situation, 7 out of 10 people don’t believe in the company’s claims on their environmentally friendly commitments.
Thus, just saying you’re sustainable isn’t enough. Consumers now demand hard proof like scientific evidence to support your environmental claims. This means that marketers have to trace and understand the true environmental impact of their firms’ entire value chains. We’re having a huge opportunity since consumers are believed to have a positive attitude towards brands that take sustainability seriously and transparently.
4. Current Challenges with Sustainable Marketing
Greenwashing (Not enough transparency)
Greenwashing refers to the deceptive practice of making misleading claims about a product, service, or company’s sustainable practices. This phenomenon originates from dishonest brands pursuing the image of being environmentally conscious without actually taking practical action to reduce environmental impact. This has brought about a loss of trust among consumers and regulators and negative attitudes towards any sustainability claims.
In January 2022, the UK’s Competitions and Markets Authority launched a Green Claims Checklist outlining expectations for truthfulness, clarity, and substantiation of green claims. While not legally enforceable, it helps businesses avoid misleading consumers and potential issues.
Negative attitudes from consumers toward unclear green claims
“Consumers want honesty and action, not just green-sounding buzzwords.”
From the above study by consultancy Sensu Insight, we can draw a short conclusion on the current situation of sustainable marketing. consumers want honesty and action, not just green-sounding buzzwords. But we’re living in a sustainability ‘bubble’, in which many brands just care more about the profit from communicating deceptive claims on sustainability.
Besides, the more brands use misleading “green” claims, the more confused consumers become about what’s truly eco-friendly. This confusion makes them wary of buying sustainable products, worrying that they might be making bad choices based on false information. In simpler terms, greenwashing makes it harder for people to buy green with confidence.
Even though consumers have become more aware of environmentally friendly consumption, they are still concerned about the credibility and trustworthiness of claims provided by the companies on their sustainability commitments. To avoid current negative perceptions and build trust among consumers, brands need to move beyond unclear green claims and embrace transparency by using data, independent certifications, and clear communication to showcase their true environmental impacts. The future of sustainable marketing lies in authenticity and substance, not ambiguity.
People are aware of sustainability, but… they don’t act on behalf of it
The most contemporary issue lies in the consumers themselves. Consumers, though interested in sustainable marketing, often buy unsustainably. Research has shown that the generation of waste is mostly linked to economic activities, which include the production and consumption of goods. We, as consumers, buy things not only to solve our problems but also to satisfy our self-interests or to seek pleasure, which is called hedonistic consumption.
Nowadays, it has become marketers’ responsibility to understand what currently influences consumer buying decisions and guide them towards more sustainable options. As marketers, we need to convert the desire for a good life into actions that actively build a healthy environment and prosperous society.
Academic sources for this blog:
Carvill, M., Butler, B., and Evans, G. (2021) Sustainable Marketing : How to Drive Profits with Purpose. London: Bloomsbury Business.
Emery, B. (2012) Sustainable Marketing. Harlow: Pearson.
Hamill, A. (2023) Confronting the knotty reality of sustainability communications. WARC. [online]. Available at: https://www.warc.com/content/article/warc-exclusive/confronting-the-knotty-reality-of-sustainability-communications/en-gb/152168.
Sy Chu
As an analytical and creative marketing enthusiast skilled in customer analysis, content research and brand management, my passion is help businesses gain insights into their brand and marketing strategies to drive impactful outcome to their success.
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Thank you so much for your kind words! I’m very thrilled that you find my blog compelling. It’s like a summary of what I’ve learnt so far about the topic and I believe it’s not been complete yet. I’m trying to update my blog once I learn new things about this. Hope to see your visit in my future blogs ^^