How do we make a sustainable marketing strategy?

The answer to this would be the silver bullet to your problems, wouldn’t it? And ours, let’s be honest.

How much time goes into imagining this unshakeable, outcome-rich, sustainable marketing strategy?

If you’re as invested in delivering something shaped by integrity, whether you’re a sustainable e-commerce, service provider or agency, sustainability is on the tip of your tongue (and your mind).

If you’re on this journey, it probably shapes every choice you make for yourself and your employees.

As the founder of Dionne Anderson Creative, reflecting on my brand principles is something I do daily. 

Consciously or not sustainable, high-level marketing strategy stays on the agenda for reasons that reach far beyond the bottom line. 

I’ll try to tackle some of my thinking around this as we go, with the hope that it will leave room for evolution in your sustainable strategy planning too.

 

I use ethical and sustainable as symbiotic throughout this article; although not synonyms, the words share the same root signifier to me, which translates as ” for better, for positive change, for impact”.

 

The definition of ethical in this context: “actively opting out of and avoiding activities or organisations that harm people or the environment”. 

It is as much about the structure of the business as the reputation of the business and the sustainability of the business, through the ethics with which they decide how to treat people who work for and buy from them.

Done right, that achieves the ethical/sustainable paradigm.

What do we mean when we talk about sustainable marketing?

This is a two-fold answer, whereby we create something that not only looks, but is, sustainable. Its application would cover a spectrum of system functions on a micro and macro level; here’s what I mean:

People as a resource

Needing people to help your business function is a no-brainer, whether you work solo or lead a team. There are always other people who play a part in your business’s functionality.

The mental, physical and emotional capacity you have can and does influence the extent to which you can work, deliver, create, collaborate, execute, refine and grow as a business.

Even if your business depends on automation, AI and tech:

Someone needs to:

• push the button to shape the processes that become automated
• have experienced the process
• understand the workflow
• understand the product expected
• to know what could be automated to begin with

On a deeper, more existential level, shall we say, our commitment to the earth as humans first and business owners second means there will be times when we simply can’t sustain or give more to our business.

We all need the essentials Maslow talked about many years ago to function as orderly people in society. This is where that “concept” of people as a resource in the shape of community comes into play.

In the human and business experience, we must experience inviting people in to support us. Whether that be staff, contractors, loved ones or all three, the access we have to support has a direct implication on our ability to sustain our business, our marketing and ourselves.

Consistency isn’t the same as a sustainable marketing strategy

To my first point, automation and AI are incredibly helpful in taking some of the burden off our daily activities, contributing in part to perhaps both consistency and sustainability.

We have accepted AI as a developed idea, and see that, yes, shaping marketing ideas, life admin, or booking the best spot for the family reunion are all heavy lifts to which AI could support us.

Our support “systems” in the peers, digitalisation of activities, and other experts we lean on while building, would have some of our output directly attributed to them. But, the point here is that whilst we might have a sustainable marketing strategy, we may often still be unable to keep the consistency of upholding it without external support.

Does that make it unsustainable, or do we just expect too much from an individualistic lens, and not enough from the collective groups around us? The execution of our marketing, i.e.

• post creation
• email newsletters
• transactional emails
• leaflet creating
• paid ad copy
• actively seeking speaking/ podcasting opportunities
• recording and editing media
• graphics
• topical research
• product and copy optimisation (SEO)
• launch sequences
• welcome sequences (and everything in between)

All come at a cost to our time, profit and general growth. They simultaneously give and demand value in return. But how often do we analyse which of those marketing channels yield the results we’re after? And I mean in more than monetary losses.

In an ideal world, our investment should befit the cost: time-in x money cost = increased return.

What I see when I take a lateral look at the landscape of businesses with a digital presence is that they lean on social media.

It’s a given that we look to an account of a business that we’re thinking about trusting with our money, and sometimes our decision to follow them is impulsive and quick, mostly based on how much visibility they have in the online space.

My question for you is, how many of us are making purchasing choices based on recommendations and referrals at a higher rate than they are from something that caught their eye on social media – a thread, a post, a cleverly placed Ad that has used our buying behaviour to show you the thing you talked about an hour ago?

Social media serves a purpose, no question – but research shows we have created a generation of desensitised digital zombies. For a small number of us who value connection and curated customer experiences, it sometimes just feels a little sloppy and sticky to think about the future of our interactions remaining in the online space.

Conveyor belt in > down a funnel > faceless

Relationship marketing vs. traffic marketing

Michelle Warner, a small business strategist and entrepreneur, talks about the lost art of relationship marketing on her podcast. The value and lesson of that one episode are imprinted in my brain.

She explains that along a continuum, relationship marketing is on the left and traffic marketing on the right. With the societal shift towards [over-consumerism, escapism], and the COVID-19 global emergency, our interactions were pushed online.

In a short space of time, we adopted a very transactional and one-to-many approach when we think about how we sell and how we’re sold to.

In the magnification of transactional traffic marketing, relationship marketing has quietly been benched in the wake of an ill-fitting mistress. That is to say, traffic marketing, i.e. Ads to the masses, is “a lot easier” to teach and emulate than relationship marketing.

Why? Well, because relationship marketing relies on much more psychological and social skills than it does to write a prompt and post. Not everyone knows how to create a human connection, let’s be honest.

My feeling around this is that many businesses that brand themselves as ethical, sustainable or B Corp are not only aligning their products with sustainability, but there will be a pull to streamline their processes, work culture, and their actions that way too.

Relationship marketing is sustainable marketing

Staying power, or your ability to weather the storm in a precarious economic environment, is one big part of sustainable marketing for me.

It’s the reason I love SEO, it’s the reason I love podcasts, it’s the reason I love walking into the room of my ideal client over shouting on a post on TT.

I am 90% more likely to remember the name of someone I’ve met in person, opted in to listen to, or learnt something valuable from. Listening to someone who says something of relevance, where I have heard their accent, cadence and tone of voice, is a pretty persuasive way for me to say ‘yes’.

If what they’re talking about has resonated with me, I’d probably go so far as to say that when it comes to needing the specific thing they offer, I think back to how that interaction went and the “vibe” I got.  It’s likely the key to shortening the buyer cycle for me, and I believe it’s the key to customer retention, and it’s the key to sustainability.

Sustainable marketing as a visual diagram

When I turned to Google to see what was out there on sustainable marketing, I found a range of things people recognise as contributing to the circular design of sustainable marketing in practice.

At its core, it has to be pushing towards circularity: giving back what it takes. Any business that wants to wear the sustainability badge with honour would have given thought to these factors, and how their company actions align with their commitment to each of these portions:

Economic contribution: Some, or all profits, or actions that have a direct impact on closing the gap in deficit, financial or resource for a particular group of marginalised people or causes.

This could also be an exchange of resources between parties, mentioned earlier–the support from others to execute, may create more capacity for us to earn, and invest in worthy causes.

Social consideration: Either directly through the product or service we sell, or through profit contributions, a sustainable marketing strategy would have some thought on how it can create a social impact.

Of course, B Corp status might be the holy grail of sustainability in practice, but how does this translate to smaller brands without this accreditation?

My thinking is that businesses wanting to practice sustainable marketing have a) the product itself directly contributing to community impact, or b) some aspects of social “give-back” in the running of the organisation or business.

Aligning at appropriate times for the business, they could choose which channels to use to share profits for good.  This could also be in the sustainable systems aspect: choosing which marketing tools they invest in, with ethics and sustainability key factors in their decisions.

Feedback-centric: Always wanting to know, always inviting feedback, from customers, sharing that knowledge company-wide to improve the experience for the end-user and staff.

Collaboration: Sharing the stage, inviting collaboration with customers and aligned brands that complement the work you do, invites sustainability through combined reach and impact.

Not only that, but shared audiences with someone who complements what you do can lead to a quicker shift in buying habits and behaviour by highlighting other companies that do great work.

Purpose-driven Innovation

What are we all doing it for? How does it help? Who does it impact, and who gets left behind? Impact through innovation can only happen when we’re clear on what’s driving our mission.

Education-oriented + Value Packed

Working with an education-oriented lens doesn’t mean you have to be an educator, nor that every piece of content needs to be to inform and educate. It’s more about living in the mindset that there should always be capacity to learn, adapt ideas, receive feedback, give feedback and help others.

Those others could be, inside the workplace, as the end-user, or as a business partner and counterpart.

Core Questions to ask on your way to sustainable strategy success

If anything has resonated with you in this article, come and share with me over on LinkedIn. Maybe you want to take that thinking a little further. If that’s you, here are some questions that might create a clearer vision for you and your team about how to move forward with your sustainable marketing strategy.

Let’s talk purpose and integrity first.

Ask yourself and your team, why do you exist beyond making money?

Do you believe you’re fixing a real problem?

Would your marketing still feel truthful if customers saw how internal decisions were made?

Customer wellbeing

Does your messaging empower or subtly exclude and shame?

Are you encouraging healthy autonomy or dependency?

Is the urgency of your marketing campaigns helpful, or driven by anxiety?

Transparency and social evidence

Can claims be substantiated?

Are experiential testimonials and claims grounded in evidence?

Power and profit

Are we optimising for short-term growth or long-term trust?

Who benefits most from our success?

Accountability

How often do we revisit our values and messaging?

What is our process for course correction when we get it wrong?

Are our team empowered enough to say “this feels wrong”?

Evidence + Actions = Living the sustainable marketing dream

I feel like the evidence of your brand’s mission can be understood in a much shorter period of time if people see our failures in public, if they’re able to see us correct our mistakes, and can clearly identify what our values are.

I also believe these things can be more quickly achieved using relational marketing, which might reach a smaller audience, but doesn’t necessarily equate to smaller reach. 

How many times have you taken the opinion of a friend as all the proof you need to try a new class, product, or place to eat? The audience is small, but the reach results in a new customer.

I’d love to hear more about your efforts with marketing. Want help to reflect on how your visibility is going this year? Join the mailing list for weekly tips.