[Video Link for Email/Other Subscribers - 64min]
Date: Nov. 8, 2008
Organizer: Opportunity Green
Tom Szaky
The story of Terracycle is a playful one marked with continuous experimentation and rethinking about waste. How can it be repurposed to make a new product that is economical from a manufacturing perspective and valuable to a customer? Tom talks about these subjects and more in this 15min presentation that begins with their humble beginnings and progresses into the company they are today, building out their product portfolio through partnerships with retailers and manufacturers to make what some may call “repurposed branded waste”.
Josh Dorfman
As the Lazy Environmentalist blogger and author, Josh has worked hard in trying to make “green” easy for the masses. In this 48min presentation, he tells us of his beginnings from working in China, doing a radio show, and other adventures in being a proponent for the movement. But of particular interest to marketers is his series of case studies on “green” products and companies, highlighting how personal emotions of desire, status, and group affiliation among others, have become the unique attractor factors for early adopters and eventual customers.
Many of his beliefs on green marketing ring true with my own and those of John Grant. To make greener products, services and even lifestyles more acceptable and desirable to the larger public, one has to make green “invisible”. If one is explicitly promoting green attributes as the reason to adopt or buy, the potential audience size will be vastly limited.
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{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
Great concept and video. If I may throw my opinion into the mix, the laws of marketing that hold true for all other products hold true for green marketing. The reason is that marketing is based on human nature, and human nature never changes.
The same psychological triggers (emotions) that hold true for other industry marketers should hold true for green marketers. The emotional triggers listed above are ranked lower than other types of emotional triggers so first it is necessary to rank these emotional triggers. For example, fear is the most powerful emotional trigger. In this case, you would create a marketing message that pings the readers/listeners fear portion of the brain. A subset of fear is anger. So let’s talk practical application.
Emphasizing the bad things that are going to happen if you don’t purchase my product is much stronger than emphasizing the good things that are going to happen if you do. This is just human nature. We more easily go to the negative side of things than we do to the positive side. So to exploit this, you can create a marketing message that shows planes running into the World Trade Center and re-invokes the fear associated with 911. Show lots of people screaming and crying in terror. You then show government research that links the funding of the terrorists that attacked America comes from oil sales. You then show something like, “We Must Break Our Dependency on Oil or Die”. You then show a family laughing and playing together with solar panels and a windmill in the background with your 1-800 number of website GoGreenNow.com or whatever at the end.
Controversial marketing? You bet. Complaints will flood in. But your message will have gotten out there and it is a sticky message that will stay in peoples heads long after they see it.
Hi Lance, thanks for stopping by.
Indeed green marketing is no different than traditional marketing. Emotions and price are the big influencers, with incentives encouraging trials and repeat purchases. The product category will determine most of the messaging, with the target audience filling in the details.
One of my main points is that potential business can be vastly expanded if we enlarge that target audience and turn-down the green messaging. Explain the inherent benefits (performance, cost, “value”) and tie them to customer desires through emotions. Regardless of environmental/social benefit (sure it has to be sustantive), the more the messaging is customer-benefit oriented, the better.