Kiwano Marketing » marketing strategy

Bringing Personality Back To Your Business

Sofia Ribeiro — Tue, 17 May 2011 04:06:28 +0000

Today I was browsing the web and stumbled on There Is Grandeur In This View Of Life. It’s an hilarious blog written by Goofy Girl, where she tells us about her life and her thoughts on random things that tend to happen to most of us. What I specially enjoy about this blog is Goofy Girl’s tone: personable, unique and sometimes outrageous – basically, it’s a blog that you can immediately see that it’s written by real person. I guess you’re probably thinking “Well, all blog posts are written by someone.” But don’t you feel frustrated to see all these blogs using bland, general language so they won’t hurt someone’s values? This is particularly true for corporate blogs. How do we go around this? Is using insipid, nondescript language the only avenue for corporations?

I have to confess I have committed the same mistake. As a small business owner, it’s easy to fall into the trap of trying to get your message to resound with the general audience. As a marketer, though, I know this is plain wrong. So how do you find the balance between genuine, personable communications and the formality expected from you?

Last year I read Rohit Bhargava’s book Personality Not Included: Why Companies Lose Their Authenticity. Rohit identifies four reasons for why businesses lose their unique feel:

1. Adding lawyers (used to) inspire consumer trust. The more successful the organization, the more layers you could expect to encounter when dealing with it.

2. Advertising (used to) define a company’s identity. Before social media, most interactions with the company were either at the customer support level or through media placements.

3. Consistency is (or used to be) a successful business practice. Companies wanted to provide a consistent experience no matter how many locations or how big that business was. Needless to say, consistency is the enemy of individuality.

4. Risk management is (or used to be) the first priority, or simply put, protecting the business from negative situations – such as an employee sharing a real perception and not the company’s boilerplate.

Obviously, companies that did manage to stand out from the crowd enjoyed great success (such as Coca-Cola in the ‘90s). But nowadays, brands ARE expected to be full of personality (thank you, social media!). We’re done with the corporate talk! Ban it from your vocabulary – it’s dead. It should have been banned long, long time ago.

How do you stop the corporate communications blandness and inject some personality into your brand? Here’s how:

1. Apply the UAT filter to your brand. Identify what’s Unique, Authentic and Talkable about your business.

2. Give a voice to your employees. Let them talk about your business on social media and actually identify themselves as employees of your organization. Don’t forget to have a social media policy in place, though – one that is flexible so it allows employees to express themselves. The goal here is to foster individuality vs the big (faceless) behemoth that is a corporation.

3. Tell your story. Every business has its unique story. What’s yours? What makes you (the business owner, the marketing person, the customer support guy) passionate about what you do? Show your enthusiasm and motivation – something that goes beyond profit.

And if you one of your status updates/brochures/ads make someone mad? Or what if an employee shares information that is confidential or simply wrong? Just apologize – you’re only human. It’s time to drop the corporate veil and let that unique personality come out.

As for me, I just glued a post-it in my home office that reminds me to drop the “marketing talk” from my corporate years and let people discover… well, me.

Social Media Crisis Management: Best Practices and Horror Stories

Sofia Ribeiro — Fri, 06 May 2011 19:40:09 +0000

Earlier this year, I had the pleasure of talking with Elisa Birnbaum, an established freelance writer and contributor at Charity Village. Elisa writes about social media strategies and tactics for non-profit organizations. This time around, she focused on social media policies – and what can happen when you don’t have guidelines in place.

”If you’re an avid devotee of social media, chances are you’ve already heard about this infamous gaffe,” writes Elisa on her cover story, Social Media: What’s Your Policy? ”A Red Cross employee uses HootSuite to send out an otherwise-innocent tweet about her alcohol-induced evening in the company of a specific beer. She thought she was sending it from her personal account. But she was wrong.

As we all know, mistakes like that are not easily repealed and once you’ve hit that send button it’s hard to take things back. But here’s the thing about the Red Cross and their reaction to the incident: no one got fired, nothing hit the proverbial fan and no one went into heavy crisis mode. In fact, they made light of the situation with an affable response.”

Elisa goes on sharing similar stories (with not so similar happy endings). After interviewing a handful of social media experts, Elisa compiled a list of top 5 tips for crafting your own social media policy:

1. Don’t forget it will have an impact on internal operations. For example, your hiring process may be affected and you may now need to re-evaluate who you hire and the type of qualifications they offer.

2. Make sure your policy is comprehensive, but yet easy to understand. Your goal is to get people to read and follow your policy (and not just scan through it).

3. Work on your policy with your marketing and sales team. Make sure your policy and your social media presence are aligned with your brand.

4. The policy should cover every possibility, including the likelihood of replacing your social media manager. People may be attached to a certain voice, making it hard for new staff to take over.

5. Keep in mind that your social media policy is always a work in progress. Social media is a dynamic, evolving medium and you want to make sure your policy stays relevant at all times.

Read the complete article at CharityVillage.com.

Business in a Changing Climate

Sofia Ribeiro — Tue, 12 Apr 2011 19:28:31 +0000

It’s becoming more and more evident: the climate is changing. In 2007, the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change produced a notorious set of reports showing the extent to which climate change is already with us, and making disconcerting predictions of the future if we fail to take action. Japan’s recent earthquake and tsunami – followed by the Fukushima nuclear disaster – makes it all too clear that natural catastrophes have a hefty impact on how we conduct business. But how can businesses respond to climate change with strategies that build economic success and a better world?

Climate change presents both risks and opportunities. Much attention is being focused on managing the risks of climate change to both environment and business. However, leading companies are recognizing the opportunities to leverage and adapt their strengths to find the intersection between strong strategy and a better world.

Join the Canadian Business for Social Responsibility (CBSR) in Vancouver on Wednesday, May 18, 2011, and learn how local and international businesses have grown their organizations by providing services, products and knowledge that help create a more sustainable world.

Keynote Speaker: Geoff Green, Founder of Students on Ice, Adventurer, Explorer, Environmentalist and one of the 25 Transformational Canadians

Leadership Panel:
Andreas Souvaliotis, President, AIR MILES for Social Change
David Demers, CEO, Westport Innovations
Stuart McLaughlin, President, Grouse Mountain Resorts and Whistler Water
Ben Packard, Vice President of Global Responsibility, Starbucks Coffee Company
Francois Taschereau, Executive VP, Weber Shandwick

When:
Wednesday, May 18, 2011
8:00 AM – 11:15 AM PST

Where:
Vancouver Convention Centre
1055 Canada Place, West Building
Vancouver, BC

CSBR will also be providing afternoon workshops for business leaders who wish to get a hands-on approach on sustainability best practices. Workshop topics include Engaging Stakeholders To Improve Reclamation Success, Defining and Developing Employee Volunteer Programs and Sustainable Procurement: A Strategic Approach. For more information on these workshops and to register, please visit CBSR’s event page.

Our Journey To Sustainability – Part 1

Sofia Ribeiro — Wed, 23 Mar 2011 03:15:25 +0000

Exactly a week ago, we joined Climate Smart’s program with the goal of reducing our carbon emissions. What a journey so far! Earlier this month, I spent 4 hours with other business owners learning about the basics of carbon emissions, top sources and the most dangerous greenhouse gases to our planet. Now that I know the nuts and bolts of greenhouse gas accounting, I’m moving to step 1: identifying Kiwano’s emissions, so we can start planning our reduction strategies.

This is not an easy task. Since we’re a small, home-based business with no manufacturing facilities or major printing processes, we have quite a small take on the environment (when compared to other businesses. One can always argue if a polluting impact on the environment can be considered small or insignificant). So we’ve decided that Kiwano should look both upstream and downstream of what we’re doing and account for those GHG emissions from third-party organizations associated to us – such as our partners, clients and contractors. Our goal? To become carbon neutral by December 2012.

And to show that we’re serious about reducing our greenhouse gas emissions, we’re publicly announcing our commitment to go carbon neutral in 21 months. There. It’s public!

I will also be posting frequent updates on the whole process, so you can see what goes into this plan and hopefully feel inspired to follow our lead.

Laying Down the Foundation

Where do our carbon emissions come from? Exactly where do they occur? Who are the biggest offenders?

According to Michelle Bonner, consultant at Climate Smart, we need to rate our greenhouse gas emissions according to their source. Each source should be rated scope 1, 2, or 3:

Scope 1:
Direct emissions. These can be natural gas or other heating fuel, electricity generated on-site, vehicle fuel (for the vehicles that you own) or refrigerants. Don’t include electricity here.

Scope 2:
Indirect emissions. It’s basically anywhere you use power that you don’t generate yourself, such as purchased electricity.

Scope 3:
Indirect emissions. In here you put everything else – anything you don’t have ownership or operational control over, such as commuting, paper use, waste, couriers, air travel and so on.

Where your reduction strategies will focus highly depends on the nature of your business. For instance, at Kiwano we don’t have significant scope 1 emissions, so we decided to take the process as far as we possibly can – and include scope 3 emissions in our reduction strategy. If you’re in the transportation business or you’re a product manufacturer, perhaps you should only focus on scope 1 emissions at this point.

We’re also following Michelle’s advice on using the TRACC methodology – principles to keep our company focused when dealing with GHG tracking and reduction strategies:
Transparency
Relevance
Accuracy
Completeness
Consistency

While doing this, we also had to answer a handful of critical questions that will help us establish best practices for the future. These include:

1. Who will lead the effort?
2. Who to enlist for help?
3. Where to store the inventory data?
4. Where to document assumptions and internal process?
5. When to schedule the annual inventory?

Finally, we needed to take into consideration which inventory period we’d be looking at. Since we’re in early 2011, and taking into consideration that our fiscal year starts in January, we decided to use 2010 to calculate our greenhouse gas emissions.

Step 1 – Mapping our Emissions

We’re still on the early stages of the process, but here’s a list of our emission sources and other considerations based on the information above:

Scope 1:
Home office.

Scope 2:
Fuel for our car (only bought in 2011)

Scope 3:
Commuting: skytrain, bus, bike (zero emissions), air travel, car (rental).
Waste: currently we recycle. Looking to compost and recycle electronics in the future.
Paper: minimal use, since we only print drafts of the materials we’re working on for our clients. Other paper usage includes our brochures (printed only when needed) and business cards. All paper has a high percentage of recycled material and/or is FSC-certified.
Other: events that we promoted or organized (5 last year); web hosting (100% wind-powered website) and data warehouse for database, CRM system and email marketing software.

As I mentioned above, this is just the initial list. Once we start gathering information on each of these emission sources, we may need to adjust our goals. As Michelle put it, we need to first focus on what we can track and then move towards a broader scope. Our goal is to include as much as possible, such as the emissions from manufacturing the computer I’m writing this post on to the recycling facility where they adapt the little amount of paper we use to produce new paper batches.

Check back in two weeks for the next step for us – calculating current emissions.

How about you? Are you considering tracking your greenhouse gas emissions? If you’re already doing this, what were your AHA-moments?

The Climate Smart Program: Cut Costs. Cut Carbon.

Sofia Ribeiro — Mon, 14 Mar 2011 22:17:25 +0000

What do Cactus Club, the BC Teacher’s Federation, Hip Baby and Purdy’s Chocolates have in common? They’re just some of the many businesses cutting costs by actively reducing their carbon emissions.

Climate Smart, the leading provider of GHG measuring and reduction training programs for small and medium enterprises, is kicking-off the first 2011 training program – so book your spot before they run out.

What strikes me as surprising is that many of these organizations are not perceived as the typical “green” brands – another indicator that sustainability is no longer a consideration for the niche, green market, but a business strategy across the board.

How It Works:

With access to a carbon management software and up to 4 hours of one-on-one technical support, the training is built around a three-step process:

1. Measure. Learn precisely how to calculate your carbon footprint through methods outlined in the Greenhouse Gas Protocol (the international standard for carbon accounting) and map your business operations to identify where your emissions occur.

2. Reduce. Develop strategies to reduce your emissions, from simply turning off light switches to upgrading boilers and encouraging alternative commuting. Climate Smart will help you figure out which strategies will work best for your business, using its software to project savings and calculate the potential payback period on each strategy.

3. Leverage. Learn how to build buy-in for your reduction initiatives among your staff, and how to talk about your accomplishments authentically in your marketing materials. You will also learn the basics of the voluntary carbon offset market—so if you want to purchase offsets and go carbon neutral, you’ll have the information you’ll need to do so.

Climate Smart alumni include the YWCA Vancouver, White Spot, Van Houtte Coffee Services, the Umbrella Short and the Surrey Board of Trade, among others.

Businesses that complete the Climate Smart program are eligible to participate in the City of Vancouver’s Corporate Climate Leaders Program. This initiative supports and recognizes local businesses that reduce GHG emissions cost-effectively. For details and a list of companies that the City is profiling and showcasing, visit the Vancouver’s Green Capital website.

Musings from a Traveling Green Marketing Professional

Sofia Ribeiro — Thu, 10 Mar 2011 21:20:28 +0000

Well, that was a long time without writing! I’m finally back in Vancouver after traveling around the world for the past 2 months. Quite some lessons I’ve learned along my journey… The most important one? The environment is definitely not on everyone’s priority list.

During my stay in Angola, Africa, I noticed a lack of the most basic living conditions, such as housing and sanitation. When asked about their top concerns, most people would reply “food on my table tonight” or “not letting the mud waters stop me from going to work, so I can keep my job.” For an entrepreneur such as myself, I couldn’t stop thinking that there’s an enormous business opportunity here – with a great potential to actually make a difference.

So, you provide a service that overall has a considerable minor impact on the environment when compared to your competitors. You’ve been fairly successful in established markets such as the US, Canada and Europe, and you want to get into new, developing economies… but your market research shows that they’re not ready yet to invest in eco-friendly businesses (countries such as Angola). Don’t feel discouraged; you may just need to tweak your key selling proposition.

Just a few days ago I was having coffee with my good friend and fellow marketer Joyce, a local online marketing expert and a young business professional. We were talking about the green industry, and how too many people focus only on the eco-friendly benefit. “If you have a product that does one thing amazingly well or fulfills a unique market demand… why wouldn’t you focus on THAT?!,” said my wise friend.

She’s right. For the past five years the green industry has grown exponentially, and it seems some business leaders are just not getting the point. On their book Green To Gold, Andrew Winston and Dan Esty outline how businesses should stay away from focusing on the green selling point; instead, smart business owners use the “Third Button Rule,” where the green benefit is part of the marketing spin, but almost as a side note.

You need to answer the question “What is truly unique about my product? How is it different from the rest?” Think about performance, cost savings, improved health, … you name it. Customize your message: identify the problem, provide a solution and give it a spin.

If you’re trying to get into a developing economy, this can be as simple as looking at the basics. If, for instance, there’s a lack of shoe wear (problem), then you can provide resilient, low-priced shoes (solution) that are made of recycled materials and/or by local artisans (the sustainability advantage).

Notice the order: first you address the main issues or concerns – shoes that are resilient (quality) and low-priced (cost-savings) – and then you mention your commitment to environmental and social responsibility, almost as an after-thought. Based on my experience, if you just focus on the eco advantage, you probably won’t go far – especially in developing markets.

So, if you’re looking to get into a country where poverty, lack of housing and clean water are the main issues, you may want to focus on products and services that directly address these concerns – always ensuring your impact on the environment is as little as it can be.

The Journey to Sustainability: A Framework

Sofia Ribeiro — Wed, 01 Dec 2010 11:26:47 +0000

Last week, I started reading The Sustainable MBA: The Manager’s Guide To Green Business, by Giselle Weybrecht. It’s been quite an interesting read, providing managers and business owners with a simple, easy to follow framework to implement sustainable business practices into their organization.

One of the chapters that stood out in this book was “Getting Started.” It’s now well known that businesses should implement environmentally and socially responsible business practices for ethical and economic reasons. But how do you actually get started?

Here are some of Giselle’s recommendations:

1. Understand where you are now.
Start by thinking about the type of company you manage or work for. Explore what is currently happening and whether you can build on other initiatives already taking place in the company or if you should start a new one. Answer the following questions:

- Where do you currently stand?
- How is your organization impacted by society and the environment?
- What impact does your organization have on society and the environment?
- What issues are important to you?
- What kind of a culture does your company have?

2. Find out what’s happening around you.
Now that you understand what is happening in your organization and the issues that affect you, take a look at what’s happening in terms of regulations, best practices and interesting initiatives others are doing. Address the following considerations:

- What regulations affect you?
- What voluntary mechanisms are out there?
- What is the rest of the industry doing?
- What are the perceived best practices?

3. Decide where you want to go and why.
At this stage, you’re starting to define your strategy and approach to sustainability. You will need to identify your drivers, baseline, budget and the best point of entry. You will also develop the business case and identify the framework and tools that will work for you.

4. Engage others and gather support.
Experience shows that, in order for sustainability to be successfully mainstreamed into an organization, employees, the CEO and other stakeholders must be fully engaged. Engagement requires building relationships not only with your customers and suppliers, but also with communities, social groups, governments and citizens. You will need to:

- Confirm CEO/management commitment;
- Build cooperation internally;
- Engage business partners and clients;
- Identify and engage stakeholders;
- Connect with outside networks.

5. Put your plan in place and make it happen.
Develop a roadmap with clear objectives and goals to help the company go where it wants to go. You will need to make short, medium and long-term considerations when drafting your strategy:

- Create realistic targets and objectives (the so-called SMART goals: specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and time-specific).
- Prioritize.
- Create a structure and pilot projects.
- Align business systems.
- Give people the tools.

6. Keep it going.
Things don’t stop once you put your plan in motion. You will need to monitor your activities, reevaluate your efforts and adjust your strategy to the ever-changing sustainability industry. Keep in mind that successful strategies take time and effort to implement and should be continuously revisited. The following suggestions will boost the success rate of your sustainability initiatives:

- Communicate internally and externally.
- Monitor.
- Scale-up.
- Look for continuous improvement.

Once you implement this framework – or a similar one – to your sustainability programs, you should see an increase in brand awareness, employee retention rate and customer satisfaction.

Climate Smart: Cutting Costs by Cutting Carbon

Sofia Ribeiro — Mon, 01 Nov 2010 19:28:13 +0000

Last week I was attending a networking event here in Vancouver and I got to meet the owner of a local small business. We were chatting about new, lasting trends in business, and I asked him what he was doing in order to become environmentally sustainable. He told me how they reduced their printing habits, and how they switched to recycled paper and started turning off their computers at the end of the day. “That’s a great start,” I said. “What’s next in your to-do list?”

Truth is, he didn’t know what else he could do. Being a small business owner, he feels that most sustainability programs out there are geared towards large corporations, and require investments that small businesses simply cannot afford.

He’s right: being in front of a sustainable marketing agency, I came to realize that there’s a gap between environmental initiatives and businesses – especially the availability of those programs for corporations versus small businesses. And this makes me wonder: in a country where over 99% of companies are considered small businesses, how come there’s still a lack of sustainability initiatives specifically developed for this segment?

So today I decided to start a series of blog posts on programs and initiatives out there geared to help small businesses become environmentally responsible. And what better occasion to talk about Climate Smart and their upcoming training program?

As part of the City of Vancouver’s goal of becoming the greenest city in the world by 2020, Climate Smart and the City have partnered to engage the business community in a comprehensive training program that takes small and mid-sized enterprises through the process of creating a greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions inventory and developing reduction strategies with a focus on cost savings, operational efficiency, and brand lift.

Climate Smart is a comprehensive professional development and training program that includes:

- A series of three interactive half-day training sessions
- Access to a top-rated, web-based GHG management tool
- One-on-one technical assistance

Participating businesses will benefit from a reduced fee and be showcased as early adopters of GHG management and leaders in the Vancouver business community. Businesses have the option of participating in one of two training groups with dates kicking off on November 25 and November 30.

Details:

Climate Smart Training Program
November 25 and November 30
From 8am to 12pm
Venues to be announced

Space is limited to 20 Vancouver-based businesses.

A brief history of Climate Smart:
Climate Smart began in 2007 through a collaboration between Ecotrust, Pembina and the David Suzuki Foundation. Since then, Climate Smart has worked with 300+ enterprises and some large training partners like Vancity, Metro Vancouver, City of Portland and the Climate Action Secretariat. Climate Smart has been recognized as the leading provider of carbon tracking tools, training and technical support to small and medium-sized enterprises and its online greenhouse gas management tool for SMEs was rated No. 1 in North America by Carbonzero.

CBSR Summit – Defining the Day: Reaching out to solve complex challenges

Sofia Ribeiro — Thu, 21 Oct 2010 13:34:08 +0000

The 8th Annual CBSR Summit kicked-off this morning with a quick introduction from Adine Mees, CEO at CBSR. Themed Collaborating for Sustainable Change, this year’s summit promises to be one to be remembered.

“At last year’s summit, we talked about transformational corporate social responsibility. One of the questions that came up was ‘How can you get together two businesses that compete with each other to work together on a sustainability initiative?’” says Mees. “Collaboration is critical for driving innovation.”

This couldn’t be more relevant for today’s businesses. As we outlined in our article Get Those Green Partnerships Rollin’, strategic partnerships allow you to:

1. Tap into market niches that you’d never be able to get into without an “insider contact”.
2. Access a wealth of information and powerful resources, already tested by other companies similar to yours – saving you time, effort and frustration along the way.
3. Grow brand champions and more effectively get the word out.

But how do you ensure you have the right framework for a successful collaboration?

• Authenticity: Businesses must have genuine intentions to be sustainable and back this up with clear results.
• Corporate Transparency: Ensure full disclosure to your consumers, critics and the financial community.
• Alignment with the Right Partner: Companies should make sure that the organization that they align with can credibly speak on behalf of all of the company’s critics.

“Sustainability is not about changing the way we do things,” says Claude Ouimet, SVP at InterfaceFLOR “Sustainability is about changing the way we think.”

Sustainability is a mindset shift that leads to businesses to action. Becoming sustainable is not just a thinking exercise; it’s a moral issue, and it must come from the heart.

“If you can inspire the people around you, anything is possible,” continues Ouimet. “You tap into people’s passion and energy,” and that is what fosters change.

CBSR Summit: Collaborating for Sustainable Change

Sofia Ribeiro — Tue, 19 Oct 2010 20:22:07 +0000

Bringing Together Corporations And The Community

What do Coca-Cola, Wal-Mart, Nestlé, Mountain Equipment Co-op and The Natural Step have in common? More than what you’d expect. All these companies are heavily investing in social responsibility programs, with varying degrees of success. And they will all be attending the CBSR Summit this Thursday, to talk about the lessons learned throughout the years. With a mix of both do-good and large corporations, it’s with great excitement that we will hear what each company is doing for their community – and how they’re able to increase their profits while doing so.

As companies around the globe work to embed sustainability into their corporate cultures, collaboration is emerging as a key lever for addressing these complex challenges. But, with so many horror stories on partnerships gone wrong, how do you ensure you’ll find the right partners – and that you’ll be successful?

As you can see from our last post, Social Enterprises: How to Make Profit While Contributing to Social Justice, there are many ways your sustainability initiatives can thrive while improving your bottom line. But no matter how you go around it, one thing is sure: who you partner with is more often than not the deciding factor for your success.

This is why the theme for this year’s CBSR Summit is Collaborating for Sustainable Change. On October 21, join CBSR for an inspiring and collaborative day where you will learn how Canadian businesses can address their CSR challenges through collaboration with internal and external partners, driving improved performance and innovation.

Some of the speakers include:

• Dr. Karl Henrik Robèrt, Founder, The Natural Step
• Tim Brown, President and CEO, Nestlé Canada
• Robert Dutton, President & CEO, RONA Inc.
• Dr. Rafi Hofstein, President & CEO, MaRS Innovation
• Nikos Koumettis, President, Coca-Cola Canada
• David Labistour, CEO, Mountain Equipment Co-op
• Nicholas Parker, Executive Chairman, Cleantech Group
• Andrew Pelletier, Vice-President of Corporate Affairs & Sustainability, Wal-Mart Canada

CBSR Summit: Collaborating for Sustainable Change
Thursday, October 21
From 8:30a.m to 5:15p.m
Le Meridien King Edward Hotel
37 King Street East, Toronto

To register, please visit CBSR’s Summit page.

Let us know if you’re coming! We’d love to connect with you.