Economics and the Environment

In December last year, the UN climate summit in Copenhagen highlighted the key climate challenges the world faces. It also brought into stark focus some of the apparent contradictions between going green and making money.

Such challenges are not just reserved for governments and global giants. Small to medium sized businesses are also looking to cut costs and go green - propelled by a raft of new legislation plus corporate social responsibility (CSR) considerations. But against this backdrop where policy and public demand is driving companies to implement environmentally responsible business practices, is going green bad for business?

One thing is sure, as marketers strive to achieve competitive growth and profitability, the groundswell of public awareness in relation to all things green is causing companies to adopt new business practices in a bid to reduce environmental waste and cut unnecessary cost.

Such initiatives range from embarking on intelligent customer retention management and lead management programmes, and e-marketing and smarter sales force territory planning practices.

In the process, more and more companies are waking up to the value of enhanced customer data quality and management - especially in the context of direct mail reduction and improved targeting. According to a survey from the Aberdeen Group 40% of respondent companies ranked direct mail waste reduction as one of their top two priorities when it came to lowering their environmental footprint.

Such views are also being supported from a regulatory perspective. The Direct Marketing Association is currently working with government, non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and practitioners to publicise PAS 2020, the first environmental standard to be produced specifically for the DM industry.

Indeed, the recent recession has engendered a re-evaluation of marketing and sales approaches in a bid to achieve more with less. An imperative that correlates with the ‘triple bottom-line’ perspective of a green marketing agenda - profit, environmental performance, and social responsibility.

This brings us back to Copenhagen, and the key message that emerged from the talks. While there may be reluctance in some quarters, ‘green growth’ is set to become the prevailing economic model of our time. Applying green principles in the sales and marketing arena is making organisations review what they do, and how they do it. As a result, they are achieving a greater understanding of who their prospects are and how best to turn them into clients – and in doing so are successfully reconciling economics and the environment.

Public opinion is causing companies to adopt green practices.