Modern consumers are keen to support eco-friendly and sustainable businesses. If you’re looking to build a sustainable brand, here are a few good starting points.
1 . Detailed audience research
If you’d like to create a sustainable brand you’ll need to start off with detailed audience research. Find out exactly who your audience are, and what’s most important to them. The more that you understand about your target audience the easier it is to build an appealing brand. When you’re conducting your target audience research, keep the following in mind:
- Create buyer personas to identify your ideal customer.
- Build your brand around the values of your audience.
- Your brand story should focus on sustainability.
2. Create a mission statement
Every sustainable brand needs a powerful mission statement. A mission statement is intended to explain why your company exists, including your ethics, values, and culture. The statement should focus on the future of your company, and what you wish to achieve. To give you a few ideas, check out these eco-friendly mission statements taken from Brands For The Heart.
Alter Eco Foods: ‘Our mission is global transformation through ethical relationships with small-scale farmers, and an integral sustainability orientation at every point on the supply chain.’
Bullfrog Power: ‘To inspire and empower people to lead the way to a renewably powered future.’
Patagonia: ‘ To build the best product, cause no unnecessary harm, use business to inspire and implement solutions to the environmental crisis.’
3. Develop your brand story
All good brands need a compelling brand story. Your brand story should tell your audience what your business is all about. The story should include your challenges, successes. Most importantly, your story needs to sum up why and how your business came to be. When you’re developing your brand story, the following pointers may help:
- Sustainability should be at the heart of your story.
- Focus on how your story helps customers to live an eco-friendly lifestyle.
- Your story needs to appeal to the emotions and values of your audience.
Once you’ve created your brand story you’ll need to decide how you’re going to communicate this to your audience. With the right marketing strategy you’ll grow your audience and drive success. To support your marketing plans consider working with an SEO agency.
4. Work with ethical suppliers
If you’re building a sustainable brand you’ll need to ensure that you work with ethical suppliers. Unless every aspect of your brand is sustainable, you may end up losing the respect of your customers. Before you commit to working with a new supplier ensure that you understand their values and ethics.
5. Use green web hosting
Green web hosts work by providing eco-friendly web hosting services, these hosts perform eco-friendly initiatives, to reduce the effects on the environment. There are a few different green web hosting companies to choose from. Some of the most popular services include Green Geeks, Dream Host, and Hostpapa.
6. Assess performance over time
To keep on making improvements you must assess your performance over time. Ensure that you gather feedback from your audience and your employees, feedback like this can help you to focus on your strengths and weaknesses.
Building a sustainable brand means committing yourself to sustainability values, and striving to do better all of the time.
