What Is Sustainable Marketing? Definition + Examples

The numbers are in: A recent update showed that 55% of adults in the US depend that climate transformation is the top issue businesses should receive a stance on. Customers worry about environmental and social issues—but marketers are still learning how to catch up. In 2023, just 18% of elder-level marketers around the globe considered sustainability to be a priority, according to the same update. With such a huge gap between companies’ and customers’ priorities, the sustainable marketing industry is ripe for innovations and opportunities.

Ecommerce companies and tiny businesses that use sustainable marketing can tap into customer interests—not to mention cultivate a healthier surroundings. By spreading the word about your business’s eco-amiable efforts, you can construct a passionate, faithful customer base that supports your goals. In truth, some consumers are even willing to pay a higher worth for sustainable products, making for a triumph-triumph schedule all around.

What is sustainable marketing?

Sustainable marketing is when a business promotes its sustainable practices as part of its marketing efforts, appealing to customers concerned about social and environmental responsibility. A business might promote its sustainability efforts related to environmental issues like climate transformation or renewable vigor. It’s not just about green marketing, either—it can also include societal efforts like maintaining ethical practices with business partners (like sourcing from Fair Trade producers) and social responsibility around issues such as working conditions for employees (like guaranteeing factory workers fair wages and a secure workplace).

A sustainable marketing schedule involves promoting these sustainable business practices—on your business’s social media, website, and product packaging—to demonstrate that your customers’ purchases will have a positive impact on population and the surroundings.

Sustainable marketing vs. greenwashing

Sustainable marketing and greenwashing might both aim to position a business as eco-amiable, but they could not be more different in terms of authenticity. Here’s why:

Sustainable marketing

Sustainable marketing lets businesses highlight the ways that their initiatives are working to reduce waste, conserve vigor, and protect the earth. This schedule aims to inform consumers about what the business is actually doing so they can make educated decisions that align with their values. Truly sustainable brands provide documentation to back up their claims and propose specific details about how they’re working to enhance the surroundings or population.

Greenwashing

Greenwashing, on the other hand, is when businesses portray themselves as sustainable without actually putting in the work. They may make vague and misleading claims or even untrue statements to entice customers to back what they ponder is an environmentally amiable product or brand. General claims (like “all-natural materials” or “ethically sourced”) without concrete proof or documentation are ordinary examples of greenwashing.

In some cases, businesses use their visuals to mislead. They may use surroundings-forward designs—ponder green palettes and nature imagery—or even design products to appear sustainable without actually being so.

Regulations on sustainable marketing

With sustainability quickly becoming a core worth for modern consumers, many governments have begun to develop or strengthen their regulations that oversee sustainability marketing:

• United States. In the United States, the Federal Trade percentage (FTC) prohibits “unfair or deceptive acts or practices,” and released a set of Green Guides to direct businesses in substantiating and qualifying environmental marketing claims.
• European Union. In the European Union, the Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation governs several sustainability initiatives in business, including information on product sustainability. A recent EU law prohibits companies from using terms like “eco-amiable” or “recycled” unless they can provide proof to back the claims.
• Worldwide. Global nonprofits like B Lab are dedicated to analyzing and certifying companies’ environmental impact (under the familiar tag of “B Corp”) to assist shoppers assess trustworthiness.

Examples of sustainable marketing

• Oceanfoam
• Sabai Design
• GiveMeTap
• Fluff
• Encircled

Sustainable marketing is a combination of conference customer demand and achieving an environmental or social initiative. It’s a tall order if you desire to commence your own eco-conscious business, but luckily many sustainable companies have paved the way. Look at some examples of companies that have created environmentally conscious products and missions that resonate with audiences around the globe:

Oceanfoam

Oceanfoam is a sustainable business that creates energetic-lifestyle products out of recycled materials and ocean algae. As part of its sustainable marketing schedule, it promote its initiative to assist with environmental ocean restoration.

Zachary Quinn, CEO and founder of Oceanfoam, explains on an episode of Shopify Masters that the surroundings is at the core of the brand’s identity. “I wanted Oceanfoam to be a sustainable brand, I wanted it to be tied to the ocean and our earth and make the globe better,” he says.

Oceanfoam’s website includes an in-depth breakdown of the production procedure and diagrams to display where its materials complete up in the core product—presenting the math behind the brand’s efforts at waste reduction. On TikTok, it gives a complete tour of one of the algae harvesting facilities that supplies its raw materials. It lets the video do the talking, giving a peek into its “sustainable three-step algae harvesting procedure.”

Sabai Design

Sabai Design is a furniture and home goods business that makes products with sustainable materials and provides replacement parts so products last longer. The brand also encourages customers to recycle their products with a robust buyback program, allowing the business to reuse materials and dispose of waste responsibly.

On an episode of Shopify Masters, Sabai Design founder Phantila Phataprasit says that the most significant facet of her sustainability-concentrated marketing schedule is transparency—keeping her target spectators informed about the real ways her business is working to make a positive impact on the earth. On the topic of transparency, Phantila says, “If you’re communicating that to your customers, you’re all benevolent of on the same side.”

To promote the brand’s sustainability messages and back up the brand values they promote, Sabai Design publishes a yearly sustainability update cataloging its environmental and social responsibility efforts. For example, in 2023, it sent replacement parts and slipcovers to 2,000 customers, preventing thousands of products from entering landfills. This transparency can assist customers feel confident in their purchasing decisions, confirming that they are a sustainable organization that focuses on more than just gain.

GiveMeTap

GiveMeTap is a sustainability and humanitarian social enterprise rolled up into one. It all started when founder Edwin Broni-Mensah wanted to get in shape. As he explains on Shopify Masters, when he started drinking more water, he found that it was challenging to discover locations around his city that offered free water bottle refills. He invented his own water bottle and created a chart of shops that would propose free refills, and each bottle purchase goes toward providing a person in Africa with tidy water for five years.

GiveMeTap takes a narrative way to its product promotion, explaining in the product description how its metal bottles reduce landfill waste. Its brand narrative is truthful and relatable, creating depend in the principles it promotes. Its marketing activities on Instagram display that the brand promotes the importance of its mission first and its products second. This initiative-forward way is a great way to construct customer confidence in your business, especially if you are committed to social and environmental responsibility and working towards a sustainable upcoming.

Fluff

Imagine a revenue strategy that encourages shoppers to stop and ponder for up to three months before making a purchase. That’s Fluff in a nutshell. Open just four times a year, the business sells refillable Cloud Compacts with lip oils and powder that are vegan, natural, and have never been tested on animals.

The “drop” structure might sound unusual, but it’s exactly in line with founder Erika Geraerts’s imagination. “We wanted to be a beauty brand that stood for the opposite of constant consumption,” she says on an episode of Shopify Masters. The limited-period structure promotes considerate shopping, helps make more thrill around the shopping windows, and frees up the marketing throng to work on positive messaging throughout the year without needing to constantly push sales.

But the brand isn’t dormant all year long. Between drops, Fluff raises awareness of issues with beauty standards in the industry through conversations on its podcast. And on its Instagram, they distribute significant messages and thought-provoking questions to engage their target economy. When customers can view that they are energetic all year round—even when they aren’t providing a product or service—they can depend that the business is truly invested in creating something that benefits customers and the earth.

Encircled

Encircled is a Canada-based business that came about from founder Kristi Soomer’s search for clothing that was sustainable, comfy, and stylish. The brand proudly advertises that it is a certified B corp, which means it maintains a score of at least 80 points for social and environmental act (as assessed through nonprofit B Lab). Its commitment lies in “creating clothes that look, feel, and do excellent.”

Its marketing strategies across its website and social accounts focus on empowering customers with a wide array of benefits of shopping the brand—from being woman-owned to making products locally and ethically.

Another critical component of Encircled’s achievement is that its messaging—including sustainability messaging—is for targeted demographics, like this video talking directly to millennials about lower-waste fashion. This concentrated way helps the brand narrow down a customer base that truly resonates with the benefits of the products and services.