Sorry for having neglected my blog for so many months, I have been busy settling into my new Hong Kong life (which I love by the way – I may share more on that later).
A new academic year has just started. ‘C’est la rentrée’ as we say in France. Summer holidays are over. I now intend to be back in full steam!
I missed all our online conversations, whether here on this blog or on Twitter. So many things have happened during these past few months (the BP spill just to mention one) and have triggered some great debates and thinking. Let’s keep it going.
There are a few draft posts in the pipeline – coming soon! Stay tuned 
Posted in Uncategorized.
By admin
– September 2, 2010
The weekend links are the weekly roundup of what I come across on the web – blogosphere, twittosphere, and online media – and that are the most representative of what’s going in the CSR and Sustainability space. In few words, some online conversations that catch my attention!
This first link will introduce you to a new and interesting form of consumer activism: the carrotmob. As The Economist says, “watch this space”.
This second link looks at the use of emotion-based communications strategies to encourage effective behavioral change.
This third link looks at the power of sustainability storytelling, notably as a solution to the difficulties encountered in climate change communications since the failure of COP15 and the climate gate.
This fourth link further reinforces the case for sustainability & employee engagement with good stats and perspectives.
This is actually all for this week. Have a great one!
Posted in Weekend links.
By admin
– April 5, 2010
Few days ago, as I was reading National Geographic’s April 2010 issue which has been entirely devoted to the single topic of water (it’s a very good read by the way), I stumbled upon the print ad below, that really does a good job at pointing to the issue of ocean pollution through a great arty visual.
Plastic bags can indeed be easily mistaken for food by marine animals, such as turtles that consume jellyfish or squid. A plastic bag floating in the water and a jellyfish are very difficult to tell apart. This makes plastic bags a particularly hazardous form of litter to wildlife. Some scientists even estimate that in certain species, plastic amounts to up to 10% of the animal’s body weight!
This is not the first time such visual has been used in ads. It is actually very hard to distinguish who came up with the original design first…!
Scuba Dogs association:
“Turn this into an endanged species. Keep the beaches clean” – 2003
Source : joelapompe
Agency : McCann Erickson Guaynabo (Puerto Rico)
Surfrider Foundation – 2005
“Help us keep the ocean clean”
Source : joelapompe
Agency : Young & Rubicam (France)
Posted in Ad of the Day.
Tagged with Ad, Advertising, Eco Ad, endangered species, jellyfish, Mc Cann, ocean pollution, plastic shopping bags, world water day, Y & R.
By admin
– April 4, 2010
Early February 2010, Tsinghua University and Ruder Finn Asia released some insightful data on CSR within the China market sphere by looking at Chinese consumers’ expectations and perceptions of CSR performance as well as the influence of CSR on consumer behavior.
3000 respondents were polled and two industries were covered for the first annual edition of this ‘CSR Index’, Fast Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG) and the automobile industry. These were not only obviously examined because of the traffic and volume each sector currently encompasses, but mostly because these two sectors came under very close scrutiny in China over the past few years: recent product safety and quality scandals (i.e. the melamine in milk scandal in 2008) sparked public outrage and profoundly affected China’s FMCG industry, while China’s auto industry became the leading automobile market in the world.
Here is a snapshot of the most interesting findings from the CSR Index:
- Product quality is the primary concern of Chinese consumers, followed by environmental protection (2nd), management integrity (3rd), philanthropy (4th), and also intellectual property issues, fair competition, and least of all, employee rights and interests.
Given the recent food safety scandals in China, consumers are demanding healthy and safe products, first and foremost. While the presence of environmental protection in second position denotes greater environmental awareness, it also shows that Chinese consumers value products’ green credentials as guarantee of good quality and safety, the same way that management integrity appears obviously as a sub-set of quality, safety, and environmental concern. Overall, the weaker position of philanthropy or other non-product related issues such as employee rights, demonstrates the importance of the ‘me’ factor (consumers will mostly care about what can directly affect themselves and their own families), and that donations are clearly not enough, companies are expected to offer products that can be trusted.
- As Chinese consumers are calling for a trustable market environment, there is growing connection between the perceived CSR performance of companies and the purchase decisions of consumers, while the Index also confirms that the more educated a target market segment is, the more concern there is for CSR.
- Chinese corporations are widely seen as faring less well than foreign enterprises, which is according to Prof. Zhao Shuguang, head of the Tsinghua Media Survey Lab, due to foreign companies perceived advantages over domestic companies in terms of management, technology, capital and resource allocation. This again demonstrates that CSR in China should be incorporated into core business practices in order to win consumers’ trust, rather than used as simple add-ons or donations/marketing campaigns.
Overall, some interesting findings, which show again that addressing local stakeholder concerns is of paramount importance when fine-tuning the local implementation of global CSR policies and strategies.
* I have been very quiet over the past month or so, due to a very busy workload, recent changes to my professional life, and in between, some nice holidays back home. I am now slowly getting back to blogging, and micro-blogging. I have missed it! Stay tuned.
Posted in China Insights.
Tagged with China, Consumers, Corporate Social Responsibility, CSR Index, Milk Scandal, Product safety, Ruder Finn, Study, Survey, Tsinghua University.
By admin
– March 9, 2010
The weekend links are the weekly roundup of what I come across on the web – blogosphere, twittosphere, and online media – and that are the most representative of what’s going in the CSR and Sustainability space. In few words, some online conversations that catch my attention!
This first link looks at the infinite possibilities of online sustainability reporting.
This second link offers a great deal of tips for all the job seekers and young graduates dreaming of a CSR job.
This is actually all for this week. Have a great one!
Posted in Weekend links.
By admin
– January 24, 2010
Earlier this week, Change, a brand innovation agency in Canada, launched “MapChange2010“, a new study comparing the real efforts that brands are making in fighting climate change, and the perception consumers have of those brands.
The results of the study showed that, across every sector (i.e. 10 of the largest consumer-facing sectors in North America), a brand’s actual sustainability record does not correlate with consumers’ perceptions and awareness. This means that, down the road, all of a company’s investments in sustainability may not pay off in terms consumer behavior or even brand equity/corporate reputation, which is directly undermining the ROI of sustainability itself.
This disconnect, or perceptions gap, often results from the brand’s failure to “talk to walk” in a credible and meaningful way. Therefore, Change developed what it calls the 5C’s of sustainability branding – a series of principles to follow when creating sustainability branding strategies:
- Consumer Facing: Looking at what the consumer is looking at.
- Competitive: To compete, brands must innovate.
- Core: Tying sustainability to a brand’s core business
- Conversational: Leveraging two-way conversations, rather than one-way announcements
- Credible: Sequence and objective credibility are key to sustainable brand success.
I would also add a sixth “C”: CONSISTENCY.
Consistency means a brand, a company undertakes sustainability initiatives that match the reality of its business and the image it conveys. This is critical for building trust, and durably affecting consumer’s perceptions and awareness. And ultimately consumer behavior. How?
- First, sustainability has to be more than just an one-off campaign. Sustainability must be incorporated into the brand’s DNA. It must reflect the core values of the brand and contribute to delivering the brand promise over the long-term. This means that a brand cannot change its sustainability focus or ‘cause’ too often, or engage in too many non-related areas. Every brand effort has to be mutually supportive in order to achieve the broader sustainability brand promise.
- Second, consistency is important in the sense that messages must resonate with the brand’s existing voice in the market place. More importantly, sustainability branding must be communicated at every possible customer touchpoint in a consistent way. The 2009 edition of the Edelman Trust Barometer indeed reported that people need to hear a message 3-5 times, from different channels or voices, in order to believe in it.
- Finally, as brand and corporate reputation are increasingly converging, with consumers not only looking at a product’s sustainability impact but also the overall environmental and social performance of the operating companies behind the brands (see the GoodGuide for instance), sustainability branding needs to be aligned with corporate communications. Such communications efforts have to be mutually reinforcing, not only with consumers, but also with a broader range of stakeholders such as employees, the media, etc.
And you, what do you think? Do you see any seventh ‘C’?
Posted in Communications, Marketing.
Tagged with 5C's, Change, consistency, consumer perceptions gap, MapChange 2010, sustainability branding, Sustainability communications.
By admin
– January 24, 2010
A new academic year has just started. ‘C’est la rentrée’ as we say in France. Summer holidays are over. I now intend to be back in full steam!
