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!

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’?

This first link looks at how to drive and/or reframe sustainability communications in the COP15 aftermath, while the second link looks at the COP15 failure from a more holistic point of view.  Two very good recaps.

This third link lists the tops tactics for proving green’s worth. Straightforward tactics, but it also good to have a list handy when drafting sustainability messages!

This fourth link will take you to a brilliant analysis of Google’s ’s announcement that it will “review” its business operations in China.

Here we go. Have a great week!

This is the question Nathan Schock of the Greenway Communiqué tried to answer in an article published in the first PRSA Tactics issue of 2010: Communicate your environmental achievements in the New Year, by reaching out to the most prominent sustainability commentators, journalists and bloggers in the US.

All these interesting inputs and answers revolve around five key principles that I attempt to summarize below:

• Be transparent. This is THE golden in sustainability communications. Greenwashing has resulted in increased skepticism and green fatigue. So, be honest. “Tell us the progress, but tell us the trade-offs, too. The cliché about this being a journey, not a destination, is true here,” says Martin LaMonica, senior writer at CNET News and CBS Interactive, blogger at Green Tech. This will help make your story human…and much more credible.

• Think about the audience. “It’s a truism, but you have to craft your pitch to the journalist and his or her publication,” explains Todd Woody, contributing editor at Fortune and blogger at Green Wombat. Understand what matters to your audience, what are the top of mind issues, what the audience wants to know and read about. This often means focusing less on green features and more on benefits such as cost savings from energy efficiency, etc. depending on what means the most to your target audience, be it customer or investor. Marc Gunter, contributing editor at Fortune and blogger at Marc Gunther adds, “I’m looking for stories and blog posts that will not only attract readers but leave them feeling that they learned something new, different or provocative, maybe even something they would pass along to a colleague or friend.”

• Prove what you say with data but still keep it clear. Facts and figures are indispensible key proof points. But don’t overwhelme the audience with it. As William Brent, senior vice president at Weber Shandwick, blogger at The Search for Cleantech advises, stay specific (don’t speak in often meaningless ‘green’ generalities) while making sure you speak in simple terms (frame your story in terms that people understand).

• Provide a bigger picture as well. It is critical to put your client’s story into context, i.e. the bigger sustainability issues around it, how this fits into your client’s overall business strategy and sustainability goals, etc. “Too many PR folks spew facts without context, leaving their audience with more questions than answers and setting themselves up for charges of greenwash, or worse,” says Joel Makower, blogger at Two Steps Forward.

• Don’t “pitch” bloggers—participate! As traditional media models are struggling with fewer reporters covering sustainability and green stories (and not only) and readers are getting most of their news via online channels, it is critical to determine how social media can best meet your needs. However, be reminded about the specificities of blogger outreach! Build relationships with individuals and communicate with one-on-one, personal messages. As Jeff McIntire-Strasburg, founder and editor of Sustainablog insists, “Don’t play the numbers game with green bloggers — blasting out press releases just doesn’t work very well in this space. Find a few you’d really like to connect with, and then do just that: try to build a relationship. Offer opportunities to talk with clients and have your client prepare for a genuine conversation, rather than a presentation of a scripted message.” This is also true for traditional media relations. Be a helpful resource to reporters or bloggers.

• If you do participate, be ready to go a step further. Jeffrey Hollender of Seventh Generation says it all: ‘The leaders will be companies willing to talk about the things their competitors are afraid to talk about.” This is probably the only way to truly cut through the clutter, isn’t it?

Image Credit: Getty Images

This first link explores human responses to environmental issues and the issues behind the state of news coverage of climate change. A MUST read. The second link looks at the state of public opinion on environment: confusion is the word. Perhaps the public opinion is just fatigued and does not see what in it for them?

This third link will take you to a very interesting conversation around CSR reporting, the GRI guidelines and the transparency / accountability issues with application levels and assurance.

This fourth link discusses the Copenhagen outcome and most especially the role governments and citizens have to play in the battle.

Here we go. Have a great weekend!

As CSR/sustainability players are catching on, one truth is to be reminded: social media is an attitude, not a technology, as showed on the slide below extracted from SustainAbility’s interesting research on stakeholder engagement through web 2.0 (click here to download the slide deck).

One of the many mistakes organizations can often make with social media is the mistake of getting on social media and learning the technology and the tools/platforms offered (i.e. Twitter, Facebook, Youtube, etc.), but not learning the best practices of what is called social media behavior.

Social media is about conversations and relationship building. Revolving around trust, social media requires openness, transparency, accountability, and two-way engagement with an ability to listen first….. and this is even more important in our field as all of these elements are fundamental principles of CSR/sustainability strategies themselves!!

Before getting on the social media bandwagon, it is therefore important to “be and live social”. As David Armano noted in HBR’s Conversation blog:

“Social media’s not a product you foist on others, or some rigid business process that, if implemented, yields results. You shouldn’t treat social media like a temporary advertising campaign. Social media is more organic than that. It’s a way of thinking and approaching business that requires passion and commitment and, above all, willingness to participate in social spaces honestly and freely and by the rules of the social network itself. When someone ridicules your organization in the social space, unfiltered in real time, how do you react? If you are trying to control rather than participate in the discussion, then you’re not living social. When your own employees talk about your organization on a social network what do you do?”

What do you think? How do you help your organization or your client be and live social?

(Full disclosure: David Armano now works at Edelman, the PR firm that also employs me.)

Titled “The DeathZone”, the latest commercial campaign by Greenpeace Energy in Germany [Update on Jan. 12, 2010: I have just been contacted by one of the copywriters behind the campaign. The campaign is not actually run by Greenpeace, but was part of a project led by students of the Miami Ad School Europe, in Germany] aims at raising public awareness around the issues of aging nuclear reactors and the real dangers and safety threats associated to it, by referring to the Tchernobyl disaster and the remaining 32km2 exclusion zone (here called DeathZone) around the disaster site.

In addition to the video below, the DeathZone campaign includes a series of billboards, a balloon release event, and a virtual line to be drawn through the city of Hamburg at a radius of 32km2 as a symbolic representation of the DeathZone.

[ Update on Jan. 12, 2010: A more up-to-date and 'official' video is available here, with a clear disclaimer at the end notifying that this film is the work of students of Miami Ad School Europe.]

All in all, a campaign that could very well be a missed opportunity for Greenpeace Energy to further its goals and generate effective engagement around an important and rather urgent issue. I explain:

• The message is flawed. Scare tactics are used. The video and the billboards feed the public with apocalyptic images of nuclear disasters, of doom and despair … similar to any ‘end of the world’ movie you can think about. The title of the campaign says it all: DeathZone.

• What about the future? In the video, it says that “60% of Germans oppose the change in the law (i.e. canceling the “nuclear phase-out option”), but the vast majority still uses nuclear power”. Here is a big challenge…but Greenpeace totally fails to offer any solution or viable alternative. In a pure dramatic style, the campaign maximizes the problem and minimizes the solution (which is actually non-existent).

• Without any positive messages or any forward looking offer, this campaign might very well leave the public helpless/hopeless. And will unlikely generate behavior change or even enhance support for the anti-nuclear cause, whether from citizens/general public … or politicians.

After 16 ads of the day…I (sadly) feel like I am repeating myself, am I ? 

Credits: Advertising Agency: Miami Ad School Europe // Art Director: Zoe Sys Vogelius // Copywriters: Duncan Munge, Amadeus Henhapl

Source: Green Advertising Blog

I have written about this topic some time ago already, but I found the diagram below very interesting as it shows the three core groups of knowledge areas that CSR pros need to nurture and expand today.

• Stakeholder Dialogue and Comns: Stakeholder engagement is the bedrock of CSR/Sustainability. Especially today as social media and digital platforms are pushing organizations to consider two-way dialogue and active relationships with their stakeholders (i.e. collaboration, co-creation) From internal comns and reporting to community engagement or consumer engagement…listening, conversation and influence skills are key! In the diagram below, they represent up to 47% of all knowledge/skills areas.

• Strategy and Business Management: ‘We can only manage what we can measure’ as the saying goes. I would also add that ‘we can only manage what we understand first’! CSR and Sustainability are first and foremost about business and strategy. It is about understanding/setting business goals and strategies, balancing risks and opportunities, measuring performance and progress, etc. It is also mostly about critical thinking and finding solutions to any types of issues any organization might face within the larger context of the ’stakeholder society’.
  

• CSR Trends and Core Issues: As I said earlier, CSR/Sustainability is an ever-changing field – in a perpetual state of beta. Keeping up with the core CSR and Sustainability issues (i.e. energy/climate, water, compliance/governance, labor relations/diversity, etc.), both in your market and globally is crucial. Staying up to date with regards to best practices, new standards and regulations, latest developments and trends is a must, not only for consultant jobs, but also for in-house positions.

This definitely reflects what I have seen lately in terms of jobs offers and requirements.

Via a very smart use of optical illusion, the black-and-white ads show images formed out of lots of small pandas…but when taking a closer look… it then becomes clear that WWF is doing much more than “saving the panda” types of initiatives.

• Antelope Ad

[Headline] Saving pandas is not our only mission.
[Body Copy] The combined efforts of WWF and our partners have sparked the recovery of the Tibetan Antelope Population.
Take a closer look at what we do and where you can make a difference. www.wwfchina.org

• Forest Ad

[Headline] Saving pandas is not our only mission.
[Body Copy] Over 10 million hectares of forests have been protected through our forest certification and sustainable forest management programs.
Take a closer look at what we do and where you can make a difference. www.wwfchina.org

• Water Ad

[Headline]Saving pandas is not our only mission.
[Body Copy] WWF and our partners have facilitated the reconnection of 17 lakes to the Yangtze River, infusing new life to its fragile freshwater ecosystem.
Take a closer look at what we do and where you can make a difference. www.wwfchina.org

A great advert series – as a proof of its success, one year later the ads are still running here and there!

Credits: Advertiser: WWF (World Wide Fund for Nature) // Agency: BBH China / Creative Director: Johnny Tan // Head of Copy: Leo Zhang // Senior Art Director: Yinbo Ma // Senior copywriters: Carol Ong, Leo Zhang // Agency Producer: Ken Wang // Illustrator: Alt Design // Market: China // Accounts Director: Jasmine Huang // Accounts Manager: Joyce Hong // Published: June 2008.

One of my new year’s resolutions will be to post weekend links more regularly, i. e. on a weekly basis! (which has been quite difficult lately).  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 explores how socially responsible investors will view companies in 2010.

This second link explain why people who volunteer are value-add hires for companies.

This third link discusses the Copenhagen outcome through the lens of China’s (lonely) rising power on the world stage.

Here we go. Have a great weekend! And a great New Year, full of surprises and happiness!!