Wednesday 13th June 2012

Marketing your Environmental Awareness

Jane Wood, Chief Executive, of Scottish Business in the Community (http://www.sbcscot.com) gave an interesting contribution at a recent networking event I attended. It is a less known Prince’s Charity but more relevant to businesses. The work they do relates to helping businesses of all sizes become more competitive and sustainable, encouraging them to market and use their sustainable or environmental approaches to their advantage. For example, a lot of businesses will recycle, set themselves targets or give to charity, but few will market this explicitly through their marketing correspondence, for example. However, Jane argued that this would help attract customers and improve the Company’s reputation, as customers have become more ethically conscious and therefore are likely to choose a Company which identifies with these values.

This can also link to enhancing employee satisfaction as research has shown that candidates are attracted to employers with more of an ethical stance. In addition, the idea of getting your team involved in recycling and participating in charity events could enhance staff motivation in the workplace, improve team building and be part of the individuals CPD (continuous professional development). It may also be a low cost approach for SME’s to adopt in their company.

As part of our own environmental awareness, we are now recycling nearly 90% of our commercial waste and we already save one hundred trees a year from recycling our confidential paper!