Episode 37:Green Versus Sustainable: What's Your Marketing Pitch?
Some cleaning companies are using the phrases “green” and “sustainable” interchangeably when marketing their cleaning company. This episode explains the difference and why you should think twice before doing the same.
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Episode #37 - Video Transcription
One of the things you'll always hear from the marketing experts is that you need to differentiate your company from the competition. And for those of you who have been providing green cleaning services, you no doubt used this fact as a way to do just that. But almost every manufacturer now provides green cleaning products and almost every cleaning company now offers green cleaning services.
So I don't think you're all that different from everyone else any more...do you? What many manufacturers and service providers have started doing is change the terminology a bit, by throwing in the word "sustainable" or "sustainability", in order to use the newest buzz word. If you've paid attention to what is going on in the industry, you've probably noticed that many people are using "green" and "sustainable" almost interchangeably. Perhaps you've even done it yourself!
Now let me just stop here for a minute to talk about the difference between green and sustainable - because there IS a difference. Green cleaning focuses on a product's impact on people's health and the environment. This is important when it comes to marketing your cleaning services because clients and prospects are becoming increasingly aware of how this impacts their business (or home, if you provide services to families). "Sustainable" goes beyond the definition of green, and focuses more on how the product is made, packaged and transported; as well as the long term affects on people's lives.
Here is an example of how green and sustainable can be different and why you need to know the difference. Let's say you decided to use a new green cleaning product. Although the product itself may meet the criteria of reducing health and environmental impacts, there may be parts of the manufacturing and/or distribution system that does NOT. If the manufacturer is packaging the product in a plastic container that will sit for hundreds of years in a landfill, well then the products is not considered sustainable, and they should not be making sustainability claims.
So if you want to start using the word "sustainable" in your marketing efforts, make sure you know what you're talking about. It's probably going mean doing more due dilligence on the products you use to make sure the manufacturers you buy from have documentation that backs up their sustainability claims. Also keep in mind that if you are claiming to be a sustainable cleaning company, that it goes way beyond just using green cleaning products. And it goes beyond recycling at your office. You need to actually look at your company's operations, which includes ways you can reduce your own energy consumption, water consumption, waste and recycling, transportation, your internal purchasing policies, your product mix and employee engagement.
Employee engagement is an important consideration because you are never going to be able to become a sustainable company if your employees are not engaged as well. So, do you still feel comfortable using the word sustainable in your marketing pitch? If not, stick with the term "green" while talking about the products you use. Then start working on the sustainable part of your business before making that claim, because your customers are starting to understand the difference and you don't want to be making claims that you can't live up to - it could ruin your credibility in the marketplace. But if you can truly say you are a sustainable company, then you ARE different from most of your competition and it WILL make a difference with your clients and prospects.
