Raising our Game

Measuring and Implementing More Sustainable Marketing Practices

As marketing teams look for ways to reduce their environmental impact and support their organisation's sustainability goals, implementing sustainable marketing practices and measuring their effectiveness is key. Here are some practical actions marketing teams can take and metrics they can track:

Digital and Paperless Marketing

• Audit and replace print collateral like brochures and flyers with digital versions that are easily accessible online.
• Track the reduction in paper usage and printing costs.
• Move marketing communications like newsletters and reports to email – remembering that the way readers digest digital content is different to old-school hard copy. Headlining, signposting and chunking content all become much more important for digital comms.
• Measure the increase in email subscribers and illustrate decrease in paper mailouts.
• Use e-signatures and fillable PDFs instead of printing and mailing forms. Track the number of electronic forms processed and don’t forget that even the most prosaic of business forms can have marketing-valuable data within them. Remembering GDPR compliance should not prevent you from analysing business data for broad-brush marketing and customer insights.

Plan sustainable events and reduce travel

• Covid taught us that we don’t always need a real-world event to connect and do great work – which is why smart planning and strategy for events can be one of the biggest marketing wins on the journey to net zero.
• Where real-world is still required, consider carbon offsets for business travel. Measure the amount of carbon emissions offset.
  

Run sustainable ad campaigns

• Use renewable energy to power digital advertising screens and billboards. Track the percentage of ads powered by renewables.
• Measure the amount of recycled and sustainably sourced materials used.

Review marketing supply chain in line with greener goals

• Work with suppliers that have strong sustainability practices and certifications.
• Track the percentage of sustainable suppliers used.
• Reduce packaging in shipments from suppliers.
• Measure the reduction in packaging waste.

Go green online

1. Reduce web site energy use. This includes minimising the use of images, videos and animations that require a lot of data and computing power. Use text-based content as much as possible.
2. Use a green web host. Choose a web hosting provider that uses renewable energy sources and is certified as carbon neutral. They will offset their carbon emissions through verified projects.
3. Optimise website loading speed. Faster page load times mean less energy is used to load and view the website. Make sure images are compressed, code is optimised and unnecessary plugins are removed.
4. Use a content delivery network (CDN). A CDN caches content on servers around the world, reducing the energy needed to load pages from a central server.
5. Switch to a green domain registrar. Choose a domain registrar that purchases renewable energy certificates or offsets their carbon emissions.
6. Limit email marketing. Only send relevant, targeted emails to engaged subscribers. Too many emails waste energy and resources.
7. Encourage paperless communications. Offer digital versions of brochures, catalogues, newsletters and other materials. Avoid printing whenever possible and dissuade recipients and downloaders from hitting the print button.
8. Track and measure carbon footprint. Use tools that can estimate the website's energy use and carbon emissions. Set goals and track progress over time to identify areas for improvement.
9. Offset remaining carbon emissions. Purchase verified carbon offsets to compensate for any emissions that cannot be eliminated through the above strategies.
10. Educate customers. Communicate your efforts to create a carbon neutral website and encourage customers to reduce their own carbon footprints.

Here at The Unknown Creative, we’re passionate about helping our clients pursue their sustainability goals. But it means we’ve had to take a close look at the way we manage and market our own organisation – with the same care and attention we build into client strategy and delivery against the green agenda.

It means we understand the small, practical steps you need to take as well being able to help with the big picture pieces around brand and marketing strategy, messaging and campaign media.

So why not give us a call or a mail and tell us what you’d like to achieve? We’re here to help.