Episode 35: Consumer Perception: How to Craft a Credible Sustainability Message in a Complex Market with Suzanne Shelton from Shelton Group
Click the links below to listen to the full episode
A good marketing plan should include communication about your company’s sustainability efforts. In this episode, Tad and Julianna sit down with Suzanne Shelton, CEO of Shelton Group, an ERM Group Company, to discuss the consumer research studies Shelton Group has been conducting for the past 17 years, the results of their recently published report The Buzz on Buzzwords: Seven Years Later, the biggest challenges companies have in marketing their sustainability efforts, best practices for communicating sustainability goals and achievements such as third-party certified products and facilities, how companies should handle not hitting a goal, and more.
Interested in submitting a question for Tad to answer on an upcoming episode? Type your question into the box at the bottom of the page!
you mentioned the market research and consumer research that you have been doing. Can you tell us a bit more about those surveys that you have been doing for the past 17 years?
“It really started on the energy side. Two to three times a year now we survey between 2,000 and 5,000 people each time. It sort of depends on the topic and the year. It is now a wide range of people and planet topics. What we are seeking to understand is what people will do, what they think they need to do, and what they say they are doing. That is the personal responsibility piece of it. The more interesting piece is what they think companies should do, how those beliefs and expectations then translate into the brands people prefer, the products they want to buy and the places they want to work. We have been doing this in the U.S. only for 17 years. Now that we are a part of the ERM, we have actually just come out of the field with a global study. It is exactly as you would expect. Americans are basically Neanderthals compared to the rest of the world. We are laggards on almost every question we ask about. It is interesting but also challenging and sort of hopeful at the same time. It is like, ”Well thank god the rest of the world is not as resistant as we are. So maybe we will get the train moving.”
But on the other hand the U.S. is one of the worst emitters. We need to start getting people aligned here. I think there is a misperception that most of America thinks climate change is not real or that we shouldn't be talking about climate change. We have tracked this for 17 years and what I can absolutely unequivocally tell you is that the vast majority of Americans believe that climate change is real. Depending on the year, only about 13%-17% are active climate deniers. But everybody else gets that something is happening. We do have a shrinking middle that is still on the fence about whose fault it is. So around 60% are like, “It's happening and it's our fault.” Then depending on the year, there are around 20% that are like, “Well it is happening but I really don’t want it to be my fault.” There are those climate deniers but the majority of us get it. It kind of doesn't matter if they think it's our fault or not our fault. If your kid is in a car wreck and calls you, your first question is not, “Whose fault was it?” Your first question is, “Are you okay?”
That is the way we need to treat it. It is kind of like anything in life. Something is happening, I should help. When you see somebody struggling, you help them. It doesn't matter whose fault it is. I think that is the approach we need to take and we need to be using the words “climate”, “warming”, and “greenhouse gas emissions.” Americans and people around the world understand it more than you might think. They don’t understand the science of it but they get that climate change is bad. They understand that it is largely caused by greenhouse gas emissions. They don't really understand what causes greenhouse gas emissions but they get that this GHG thing is tied to climate change and it is bad. They are able to identify from a list that these are the bad things that are going to happen because of climate. They are not as educated as maybe some of us in this industry would be about all the bad things that can happen, but they get some of the bigger events. They understand sea level rise and extreme weather events. I mean we are seeing it happen every day. The research gives us a great jumping off point. We do a lot of custom research for our clients as well. We are able to come in and say, “Look, here is all this stuff we already know and we have been trending it for the last 17 years so we don't have to reask any of this. What we can do is go deep.” Our VP of Market Insights often calls it “core drilling.” Our research allows us to identify the general area where we need to drill and then for the client we go core drilling to go deep on topics that are specific to their business or their opportunity in the market.”
you recently published a report called The Buzz on Buzzwords where you did an update on findings from the buzzwords report back in 2015. What did you find most significant about the change in buzzwords between 2015 and 2022?
“The idea here is we test around 15-20 different words that are used a lot by corporate America as we talk about sustainability. So terms like green, sustainable, recycling, recyclable, net zero, etc... What we are seeking to understand is if any of this resonates with people. Do they get what in the world we are talking about? The last time we did this study, the term ‘green’ very much had the label of expensive. So if it said ‘green’ it might as well say expensive on the product. Now, not as much. We have really seen that significantly decline. We don’t have to worry about that as much anymore. We used to have a lot of hand-wringing with our clients like, “If we call the product green people are going to think it is more expensive.” Not so much anymore. In fact, people sort of expect that companies by now have figured out how to make products that are good for people on the planet at the same price. The consumer attitude is, “You all should just be doing that. Don't charge me for it. You are a giant company so you should figure out how to do it.” There is a baseline expectation now and we have kind of seen that flip with consumers.
Recycling is another one. Though people absolutely understand the language of recycling, the tone is different. We are seeing less and less belief that recycling works which is concerning because we need people to keep doing it as we sort out how to solve for all those systems. Whereas ten years ago, there was a real willingness to do your part. There is a bit of a minor backlash like, “Wait a minute, why are you putting it on me? I didn't buy the package.You made me take the package so, Mr. Manufacturer, Mr. Brand, Mr. Big Company, you need to take care of this. It's your responsibility to figure out how to make it properly be recycled or properly be composted. It shouldn't be on me.” There is this kind of shift around, “Wait a minute. I'm going to expect big companies to solve all these problems. I'll buy your products, but you need to figure out how to make it affordable and you need to figure out how to deal with it at the end of its life.” That is kind of a general shift. It doesn't specifically show up in buzzwords but we are seeing it as we do qualitative work.
Another big shift in the numbers is the political divisiveness of some of these words. Back in the mid-teens, words like ‘green’ or ‘sustainable’ were seen as ‘tree huggery.’ They were seen as the purview of the left. Democrats are green. Now, these words test well with both Democrats and Republicans as being good for business. If I am a Republican, I am more likely to say it is a Republican word. If I am a Democrat, I am more likely to say it is a Democrat word. So we are seeing that the parties are able to embrace these words as their own and they are not as politically divisive as they used to be. It is like we turned a corner on the environmental piece. So as a company or a brand, you are not going to be painting yourself with a big liberal brush if you talk about green, the climate, or greenhouse gas emissions but you will get painted with a liberal brush if you talk about DE&I. We will eventually turn that corner on the social side as well. I have faith because we have seen it happen on the environmental side. So those are the biggest changes we have seen. If you ask me what the number one thing a company can say to a consumer to make them more likely to buy their product, the clear far and away answer is to tell them you have recycled content in a recyclable package or product. It is all about recycling because that is the message we have given people for 40 years. “Oh, it's green. It has recycled content.” That is the message we have put out and it continues today. Go to any grocery store in America and you will see tens of thousands of recycling messages on every package on the shelf. So what companies tend to do with that information is, “Ok, well we will keep talking about recycling.” It is not that you shouldn't, you should keep doing that if it’s actually true.
Keep doing that, but don't just do that. We have to start talking about climate. Buzzwords reveals that people may be a little bit more comfortable with words like greenhouse gas emissions, net zero, or carbon footprint but they still don't really get it. They don't get it nearly the way they get recycled content and recyclability. We have to help them get it. Because we need to start talking about this for two reasons. As I said earlier, companies are spending tons of money on this, you should get credit for it. But also, it is all hands on deck. We need everybody working towards this goal. Companies only talking about recycling is like a doctor only talking to a cancer patient about taking vitamins. Vitamins are helpful but they are not going to solve the cancer. Recycling is helpful but we can't recycle our way out of climate change. So we have to talk about both. We have to talk about recycling and recycled content and we have to talk about greenhouse gas emissions and reduction in environmental footprints. We have to be doing both so companies have to get there and we have to get people comfortable with the language. We have gotten people comfortable with all kinds of language related to our phones. We can teach people new things. We just have to start doing it.”
What are some best practices for communicating about products or facilities that have achieved third-party certifications? Is this something you are seeing consumers look for?
”Pretty consistently. Consumers and business decision-makers use certifications and labels as a shortcut. When we ask people, “How do you know a product is green?” labeling is the number 3 way, but we have seen that increase in importance over the last ten years. People are looking for the shortcut because they don't know who to believe and they don't understand all the language. If they see a variety of ecolabels on the back of a product they go, “Okay, great. It checks my boxes.” They don't recognize all the ecolabels. They don't understand what they all mean. Frankly, I would like to see us have a bit of a consolidation of some of those labels and I'd like to see those labels and the brands get out and really promote what they mean and what they stand for so that a consumer knows. Right now, basically what they know is Energy Star and USDA Organic. Beyond that, they don't know what all those labels stand for. I think brands need to do a little bit more heavy lifting to help consumers understand the value of those because people are looking for them. It's a shortcut.
In the early days we used to have a lot of clients who would say “we need to have our own label, our own certification, or our own criteria for declaring a product ‘green’ or ‘not green.’’ The answer to that is “Nope. You need an outside third-party to do that for you. That carries a lot more weight with consumers.”
There are many corporations that are setting really big goals and science-based targets and many of them don't even have a plan to get there. What are your thoughts on the risk of this and how should a company handle their communication if they don't hit a goal?
”That is really tricky. Once upon a time in sustainability land, we used to follow that mantra, “Just set the big goal. It doesn't matter if you don't know how you are going to get there. You will figure it out.” It holds you publicly accountable because now you have said it out loud and consumers are okay as long as you are transparent. So that is still the answer. You need to be transparent. You need to say, “We are missing the mark here. Here is what we are struggling with and here is what we are trying now.” You do need to own it. What we are actually seeing is that Wall Street has a lot less patience with that approach. If you have a 2050 goal, they want to see where you expect to be by 2030 and what your roadmap is. You can't be vague anymore. You have to have a plan now. It's possible you could have the plan and still miss the goal and that is where you get transparent about it and do continuous improvement to try to get there. But you can't be vague anymore. Nobody buys it. Wall Street certainly doesn't and consumers don't really buy it either.”
MORE VIDEO CONTENT
ABOUT Suzanne Shelton
Suzanne Shelton is the CEO of Shelton Group, an ERM Group Company, the nation’s leading marketing communications agency entirely focused exclusively in the ESG space. She regularly counsels C-level executives at Fortune 1000 organizations on how to best define and leverage their sustainability approaches to drive business results. She currently serves on the board of the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy (ACEEE) and the executive advisory board of Cyclyx, and recently served on the board of the Energy and Environmental Building Alliance (EEBA). Ms. Shelton offers insights and inspiration on conference stages around the country, guest writes for the likes of Fast Company, Green Builder and GreenBiz, and directly manages a team of leaders who, collectively, have made Shelton Group a 30-year success story.
WE’RE ANSWERING QUESTIONS FROM OUR AUDIENCE!
Anonymously ask Tad a question about sustainability by typing your question in the box below.
We will answer your questions on an upcoming episode.
