You may have noticed that “green” is in.  Okay, let’s be honest—green is everywhere!  It seems that everyone is desperate to show their green side and differentiate on the basis of environmental conscience.  But now that the mainstream has caught up to the thought leaders and pioneers of this crusade, what does green branding really mean anymore?  Has ecological responsibility already slipped from “bold differentiator” to “table stakes?”  Is it impressive or simply expected?  And if it’s expected, isn’t that serving a greater good? 

First of all, I think it is still possible to stand out by making a difference in this arena.  While the noise around green marketing has become distracting and confusing, I still believe that truly eco-conscious firms can rise above.  One way is track record: if you were brave enough to be ahead of the fashion, maybe it’s time to remind your audience who was here first.  I say, embrace all the late-comers and applaud them for coming around to your way of thinking.  You were planting trees back when that wasn’t a marketing expense?  Remind the good people—you’ve certainly earned it.   

Another way for green incumbents to keep ahead of the curve is to push out the horizon.  It’s easy to claim your undying love for the Earth, but can you count the ways?  Scholars have identified all sorts of metrics for achievement in this area.  Can you set the bar for others to follow?  If so, shout it from those deforested mountain tops!  

If you’re late to the party, however, please be aware of message fatigue.  The American consumer may expect you to go green, but if you have no plausible claim to the cause, it’s best not to pretend you’ve been there all along or that it’s core to your mission.  This is a revolution and every company SHOULD be involved to the best of its ability, but differentiator-status should be reserved for those who make this a real priority.  Why?  Well, for one, because consumers are passionate, informed, and they can smell a phony.  If your green efforts are modest, perhaps it is wiser to showcase them as a point of parity, rather than a point of differentiation.  You’re doing your part and that’s important, but crowding the leadership space with illegitimate claims of heroism is dangerous all around. 

This brings us to my last question: so what if everyone is clamoring for green attention?  If the end result is a net gain for the planet, isn’t that worth a little chaos along the way?  My fear is the potential backlash of a public space suffocating in good intentions.  It’s taken environmentalists decades to bring their message to center stage and still they battle for credibility and acceptance.  It is precisely the vital nature of these initiatives that dictate caution.  In a word, green marketing must be “sustainable.”  To dilute this effort with half-hearted campaigns and reckless saturation does harm to your firm and to us all.  If the consumer tunes out, the battle is lost.  As brand managers, I hope we will all help to guide companies in our care toward green strategies that really help more than they hurt.  The stakes could not be higher. 

-Bob Zammit

Twitter and other social networks are real-time exposes of a company’s brand. Not only can they air a brand’s dirty laundry and bad decisions in a hot second, but they can influence and dramatically sabotage a brand’s external marketing efforts—resulting in a negative ROI. Yikes.

As evidenced by Wade, of The Brain of Wade, who used Twitter and Flickr to gain support for his own grievance with Henderson & Horning for their sexist advertising campaign, it only takes a matter of days to challenge a brand’s reputation. Wade states that, “the hook with social networks lies in the fact, that before the world of flickr and twitter, I would have been isolated, and have had no where to turn to. Thanks to flickr and twitter, there’s now a place to converse about this issue, as well as a network of support/guidance. A once lost voice, is now heard.”

Now that the challenge is out there, Henderson & Horning will have to do damage control.

Had Henderson & Horning more critically assessed their advertising campaign to ensure it reflected their brand appropriately, or, had they addressed Wade’s concerns when he called to complain, Wade may not have decided to lodge a formal complaint and keep the issue alive—for weeks—via social networking. Everything you DO and SAY matters in brand management. Absolutely everything. And, never has it been more painfully true than now in the world of social networking.

–Jen Travis