Why Green Marketing?

It builds buzz. Although green marketing has been around since the 1980s and 1990s, green has gained more prominence recently. (Similar to movement toward cause marketing that began in the 1990s. For example, October has become breast cancer month—pink product contributions.) Today’s consumers are more aware of green issues. For the Generation Y and younger groups, green is a cause and opportunity to influence their environment.

Buzz Examples:
- Energy Star rating on appliances
- Al Gore’s Oscar-winning film “An Inconvenient Truth” on global warming
- “We Campaign” Commercials
- Special news programs/features highlighting ecological impacts
- Ozone action days
- Recycling education and efforts
- Beijing’s efforts to reduce air pollution leading up to the 2008 Summer Olympics by restricting driving
- Green roofs like one at Ford Rouge plant
- LEED certified buildings

It creates connections. Generate goodwill with employees and customers by showing you care about the environment and offering them opportunities to contribute to your business’s effort to be green. Make them feel like their purchases are not simply personal indulgences, but going toward a good cause. All things being equal, it gives them a good reason to do business with you.

Connection Examples:
- Paper vs. plastic shopping bags (or better yet, reusable shopping bags)
- Bring your own mug/beverage holder to your local coffee shop
- Bike racks in front of businesses to welcome cyclers
- Recycling office paper, toner cartridges
- Reducing electrical use after business hours (turning off lights, computers, etc.)
- Use green cleaning products in your business
- Hospitality industry – hotels’ efforts to reduce water use by cutting back on laundering bedding, towels
- Carpooling for employees
- Encouraging purchases by donating a portion to a green charity
- Accepting products you sell for recycling

Tells while it sells. Green products, packaging and services have a story to tell. It might be about your business, your environmental commitment, your support of green charities or community efforts.  Brings community service message into the selling process making it a slightly softer sell.

Telling/Selling Examples:
- Marketing collateral printed on recycled paper
- Manufacturing operations using green methods (water conservation, pollution reduction)
- Reduction in product packaging, especially use of plastics
- Adding footers on e-mail asking receiver to think of the environment before printing
- Using environmentally friendly components and vendors in your manufacturing process

Questions and ideas to think about:
1. What are you doing now that is green? Tell your customers and employees.

2. What green practices can you easily implement in your business? Ideas: Recycling paper, printing only essential pages of e-mail, switch from mailing information to e-mailing it and posting it online, providing public transportation passes for employees, putting your annual report online, using e-mail for regular customer communications, setting up trash recycling within your business location, centralizing supplies for employee use to cut down on waste and save dollars at the same time.

3. Can you partner with green vendors to supply your needs? Is there a cross-promotion opportunity to get out the message?

4. Can you host a green event? Ideas: Show customers how to use your product/service in an environmentally responsible manner. Celebrate Earth Day. Plant trees on your property. Have your employees join in a community clean-up/recycle event.

5. Educate your work force about ways they can easily be greener both at work and at home.

6. Incorporate a green message in your publications, if appropriate.

7. Sponsor a contest that reinforces green behavior for employees or customers.

8. Use a green reminder campaign.

According to the U.S. Small Business Administration’s Office of Advocacy, small business creates between 60% and 80% of our country’s net new jobs, every year. To keep a small business growing, small business owners need to market effectively, often with a small budget.

Susan Voyles, owner of the public relations and marketing firm, Logos Communications, offers these five cost-free marketing ideas to small business owners.

#1 Don’t underestimate the importance of networking. If you belong to a professional organization, don’t waste your membership dues – get to know other people by becoming involved and networking.

# 2 Ask your customers for referrals. It takes far less effort (and money) to get a customer referral from an existing source, than trying to find new customers through advertising. Also, ask clients for reference letters you can use to win new business.

#3 Have a tagline that communicates what you do easily and clearly. Display it on your web site, in your ads, on your business card and brochure.

#4 Think beyond what you do now. Are there opportunities for business that are closely related to what you do now? Is there an opportunity being offered to you that is different than what you do, but you might be interested in trying? “When I started my business, I didn’t envision teaching at the college level. But I’ve taken opportunities to teach journalism and public relations courses at local colleges,” said Voyles. “It’s not my core business, but it’s something I enjoy and it brings in extra revenue.”

#5 Win an award. Awards are great opportunities for publicity and building your business reputation. Find out about your industry’s awards, community awards and professional organization awards, and get nominated (or nominate yourself). Also, consider nominating your best customers for awards. It improves customer relations and has the potential of associating your company with an award-winning business or individual. (Some awards do require entry fees, so this may require some marketing resources, but it could be well worth it.)

An employee who was fired for embezzlement starts circulating emails that inform people you are about to go out of business. A contractor is using your company email to send out solicitations to people to visit a gambling site she has created. You are selling your business to a long-time, trusted employee and want to assure your customers that everything remains in good hands – should you set up a blog?

In today’s business environment, where emails spread faster than a bad cold and blogs are the order of the day, every business should have a plan for communicating during a transition or crisis, according to Sue Voyles, founder of Logos Communications, Inc. 

Whether it’s embezzlement, workplace accident, natural disaster, lawsuit or layoffs, every business owner should be prepared to communicate to both internal and external audiences. These audiences include employees, vendors, customers, business allies and the media.

Here are some tips for creating a communications plan that will guide you during those times of transition or crisis.

1. Designate a spokesperson. Your business should have only one or two key individuals that may speak to the media and respond to customers, vendors and employees during a critical situation. A spokesperson may be the owner, CEO, PR counsel, HR manager, attorney or another trusted individual. Only these individuals may take and respond to media and other inquiries. Once these individuals are identified, communicate this information to all employees.

2. Speak to employees first and be frank. Put safety and people issues first.

3. Never lie, cover up or say “no comment.” Give the facts as you know them.

4. Make sure you tell your side of the story, including key messages. If necessary, issue a press release with the facts and get it out to all pertinent audiences. Post information on your web site. If your business is responsible for what has happened, tell why it happened and how you will fix the problem.

5. Be timely in responding to inquiries. If a reporter calls, find out their deadline and ask if you can get back to them. Then prepare your message and call them back. Prepare a message ahead of time for when customers or vendors call.

6. Remember the three C’s – confidence, control and credibility. Have confidence when delivering the message. Exercise control over the message by having a designated spokesperson who communicates the key points. Maintain credibility at all times; if you don’t know an answer, say so and get back to the individual.

Create your communications plan, communicate it to employees and make sure they understand it. Remember, during any transition or crisis, your company’s hard-earned reputation is at stake. Take steps now to protect that reputation.

• Know the purpose of the speech or presentation and know your audience. Make your material relevant to the audience.
  
• Follow the time-tested rule: Tell them what you are going to say, say it and then tell them what you’ve just said.
  
• Build audience rapport. Be animated in your facial expressions and body language. Dress appropriately for the group you are addressing.
  
• Plan your visual aids ahead of time. Useful tools include overhead transparencies, handouts and computer visuals (i.e. PowerPoint).
  
• Do not memorize or read your speech. Only memorize the significant points and use notes or an outline to guide you.
  
• Be sensitive to diversity in your audience. Be cautious of your language and stay away from clichés.

When giving a presentation, you should prepare thoroughly, rehearse a lot, make sure to time yourself and check out the presentation room ahead of time. Greet the members of your audience and use stress-reduction techniques to remain calm.

During the presentation, it’s helpful to pause a moment before jumping right in and it’s best to have your introductory statement memorized so that you may make eye contact with your audience. As you are speaking, maintain eye contact and maintain complete control of your voice, vocabulary and speed.

Talking in front of a group will most likely be tough at first but with time it gets easier and can actually be fun. Just take a deep breath and remember your audience wants to hear what you have to say.

It can be as simple as a memo asking employees to review a new policy, or use a special entrance during business hours. Often, however, poor business writing can lead to such simple messages becoming unclear and the objects of the company rumor mill.

Sue Voyles, president of Logos Communications, Inc. points out that memos often take way too long to get to the point, and contain unclear language and inappropriate tone. Using jargon and confusing sentence structures causes employees to miss the point and put the memos aside, she said.

Problems created by unclear communication include:

• Extra effort to rework the memo
• Additional time to call and email people to explain the memo
• Frustration to the recipient of the memo

“Make memos simple and direct, skip the fluff and the large vocabulary,” said Voyles, who has written letters, memos, press releases and many business communications for 20 years. “Using a template can make the writing process easier. Finally, make sure your tone is suitable for your message.”

Readability plays a large factor in whether a memo is understood. Readability is measured based on:

• The number of syllables in a word
• The number of words in a sentence
• The number of ideas in a sentence

The more of these you use, the harder it will be for readers to understand.

Keeping the readability level to between eighth and 12th grade is ideal in business. Other ways to help readability include:

• Well-organized paragraphs
• Transitions to connect ideas
• Headings and listings to separate ideas
• Appropriate tone

The tone is very important because it reflects how one feels when reading or hearing the message, Voyles points out. It shows that the writer cares about the receiver of the message. It also reflects upon the writer personally as well as affecting morale and motivating people.

Clearly written business documents ensure reader comprehension and quick response, which is important with the high volume of information that gets passed through offices each day.

“Why say something in three sentences when you can say it in one?” Voyles points out. “Why say something in 12 words when you can say it in six?”
Voyles recommends writing communications so that the most important information is listed first, while descending to the least important. The communication should answer the following questions: Who, what, when, where, why and how.

Creating a template based on this simple structure will produce communications that are readily understood by everyone in the organization.

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Over a lifetime, 85 percent of a person’s success comes from communications skills and only 15 percent is information or education-based, according to a 30-year study by Carnegie-Mellon University. National speaker Dr. Lawrence Helms, psychotherapist and trainer, often shares this statistic when making presentations to businesses.

Having the right word is imperative in business because people are bombarded daily with hundreds of messages through e-mails, web sites, voice mails, television, newspapers, magazines and radio. If you want to make your business stand out, you need clear, concise words to cut through clutter and deliver your message static free, says Sue Voyles of Logos Communications, Inc.

Benefits of good communications are:

• Inform or educate your particular public.
• Persuade people to take certain actions (such as using your service or buying your product).
• Motivate employees to “pull for the team.”

A professional communicator can help you . . .

• Form reciprocal relationships with the media through arranging and monitoring press interviews, writing news releases, organizing press conferences and answering media inquiries and requests.
  
• Strengthen community relationships through open houses, tours and employee volunteer efforts to reflect the supportive nature of your business.
  
• Coordinate relationships with outside specialty groups, such as suppliers, educators, students, nonprofit organizations and competitors.

Among the most important aspects of public relations practice is setting clear goals, objectives, and targets for the tactics applied.

Components of a public relations plan include:

• Specific aim of the campaign and desired goal.
  
• Situational analysis, scope of assignment, target audiences, research methods, key messages, communications vehicles, project team, timing and fees.
  
• Detailed operating tactics, activities, responsibilities and deadlines.
  
• Clear evaluation methods.

Besides your external communications, don’t forget, your most important communication is with employees. A survey of 700 employees at 70 companies found that 54 percent felt that management didn’t explain its decisions well and another 64 percent said they didn’t believe what management told them, according to Steve Rivkin’s article “Mutiny in the Cafeteria,” published in Public Relations Strategist.

It’s unrealistic to expect business owners to handle all aspects of their company’s communications strategy. A professional communicator can make your business shine.

• Define your purpose. Do you want to inform, influence, motivate?
• Is the meeting part of a bigger picture? Define the pieces.
• Does this meeting need to lead to anything else?
• What information or actions needs to "stick" following the meeting?

• Who needs to be involved?
• Who else needs to know?
• What will make the right people want to participate? Try to “stand in their shoes.”

• Remember that calendars fill quickly
• Provide complete information – include details on who, what, when, where and why.
• Always provide a feedback loop for questions, arrangements, etc.
• Build in contingency plans – system failures, last minute attendees, follow-up info, etc.

• Provide directions to the site that include all of the variables; i.e., parking, security, entry doors, etc.
• Let them know the rules for participation and courtesy. (Don’t put phones on hold during a conference call, etc.)
• Send an agenda prior to the meeting. 

• Be sure the room setup works for the situation – adequate room, comfort, audio visual equipment (always test it beforehand).
• Plan the agenda with logical progression and adequate breaks.
• Make sure that speakers project their voices for all who are listening – back of the room, conference call, recording device, etc.  
• Provide refreshments, or at least access to resources, if the meeting will be longer than two hours.

• Acknowledge challenges as they occur, but emphasize the positive aspects of any topic.
• Realize that excitement and confidence will help sell ideas, while pointing out negatives will discourage participation.
• Make all participants feel like their involvement is important.

7.       End on a high note.

• What's the take-away that conveys we have momentum?
• Briefly summarize the outcomes.
• Always end with what's next.