Brand marketers
should find simple ways to change people’s behaviour that appeal to emotions
rather than rational logic if they want to succeed in making consumer
lifestyles more environmentally friendly, according to industry leaders.
Companies such as Unilever and Marks
& Spencer are looking for ways to change consumer behaviour to reduce their
impact on the environment. This is because the majority of the businesses’
environmental impact comes from consumer use of their products, despite
improvements to the supply chain and manufacture of products.
M&S launched its ‘shwopping”
initiative, fronted by Joanna Lumley, last week to encourage customers to
recycle their old clothes at the same time they are buying new ones. The aim is
to reduce the amount of clothing sent to landfill each year. The retailer says
it is the simplicity of the initiative that will be key to its success.
Speaking to Marketing Week at the
launch, marketing director Steve Sharp said behaviour change is a challenge
because some customers just aren’t willing to change, whether it’s recycling
clothes or swapping to more sustainable fish under its Forever Fish campaign.
He adds that giving a direct instruction with something simple to do is key to
retailers and businesses achieving social change.
Unilever chief marketing officer
Keith Weed also aims to help make sustainable behaviours commonplace, but
believes that marketing has to be more than just telling people the right thing
to do.
At an event to mark one year’s
progress of its Sustainable Living Plan, Weed said that behaviour change is the
area in which the company has made least progress.
He cited the example of the Comfort
One Rinse laundry detergent it has introduced in developing countries. While
product innovation means that half the normal amount of water is needed to
rinse clothes, people continue to use more water than they need. Weed says this
is proof that Unilever must work harder in its marketing and communications to
elicit behavioural change.
Unilever believes that its role is to
find the right triggers for behaviour change so that people will start doing
the right thing without thinking about it, because while people may “nod their
head and say yes” to more sustainable lifestyles, in reality it is difficult to
change a habit.
Rory Sutherland, executive creative
director and vice-chairman of OgilvyOne London and Ogilvy & Mather UK, has
long advocated the use of heuristics, a sort of ‘common sense’ method of
problem solving, in marketing to encourage behaviour change. Rational
instruction, he says, requires active thought and so is less likely to be
effective.
Speaking at an OgilvyAction event
this month, he said: “[Marketers should] come up with recommendations about
behaviour that are easy to do without consciousness, rather than something that
requires conscious thought.”
Sutherland cites the example of
responsible drinking campaigns that ask people to drink fewer than 21 units a
week as “hopeless” because it appeals to rationality, rather than emotion.
Instead he says campaigners should encourage people not to drink for three
nights a week, which he says is easier to apply, and will therefore be more
successful in changing behaviour.
Five Levers for Change
Unilever’s behaviour change model, used by its marketers to encourage
sustainable changes in living habits
1 Make it understood to raise awareness
and encourage acceptance.
2 Make it easy to establish convenience
and confidence.
3 Make it desirable so the new
behaviour fits how people like to think of themselves.
4 Make it rewarding by articulating the
tangible benefits.
5 Make it a habit to hold the behaviour
in place for the long-term
