SCE: Sustainable Marketing Communications

In this week's sustainable marketing class, the topic we discussed was sustainable marketing communications and how businesses communicate, deliver, and exchange offerings that have value for customers, clients, and society at large.

In today's age, it seems like we are always being sold to with ads. We see ads anywhere from the side of the road to the preferred social media platforms, attempting to convince consumers to purchase unnecessary items. These tactics have given marketing communications a "distorted mirror" view, which encourages overconsumption, selfishness, stereotyping, superficiality, and homogenized consumer culture. To move away from this view, marketers need to focus on building relationships, interacting with their consumers, educating, authenticity, and promoting a more sustainable life.

One brand that is focusing on sustainable marketing communications is Reformation.

• This sustainable clothing brand aims to make "Killer Clothes that Don't Kill the Environment." On the reformation website, you can find a sustainability page that aims to engage with their consumers on what impact fashion has on the environment and what they are doing to be sustainable.
• They also work to educate their customers on how they can take care of their clothing. They give tips on washing, dry, spot clean, and information on how to clean products properly with synthetic fibers that can get into waterways and cause pollution.
• Reformation has also partnered with Thredup encouraging their customers not to throw clothing away but instead, give it another chance.
• To encourage customers to reduce their carbon footprint, Reformation has developed a promotion program that promises customers a $100 gift card if they switch to wind energy, which doesn't cost more!

What Reformation is doing with its sustainable marketing communication is incredible. Reformation uses their website (their Instagram also) to educate and engage its customers about issues that customers are concerned about. In the book " The New Rules of Green Marketing," consumers are more likely to trust information from people they know or a brand website. 70% of consumers said they would trust brand advertising on the brand's website, meaning that reformation communicates correctly to its customers. This trust instilled in the brand's website can help create relationships and customers that will keep coming back.

Source:

Ottman, J. (2017). Chapter 6. In The New Rules of Green Marketing: Strategies, Tools, and Inspiration for Sustainable Branding (pp. 121-123). Routledge.