There’s been a lot of discussion about elevating corporate responsibility to become a strategic driver of your business. Most companies would like to benefit from their ethical efforts in the form of increased customer attraction and loyalty, yet few have figured out how to do it successfully. When marketing and PR are relied on, it [...]
When building a reputation as an ethical company, actions speak louder than words. Yet in most businesses, these actions are happening behind the scenes through employee, philanthropy and supply chain initiatives. If customers can’t see these actions, there’s minimal impact on perceptions, purchase and loyalty. If you want your good intentions and efforts to be [...]
I’ve always been interested in leveraging Maslow’s hierarchy of needs to inform development of customer-based brand strategies. A couple years ago I wrote several posts about each of the stages (summary here). Recently I’ve been thinking about how it applies to CSR and sustainability efforts, especially in light of the economic downturn. As the economy [...]
Last week I wrote about lessons learned from Liberty Mutual’s focus on responsibility. 24/7 Wall St provides some much better, albeit disappointing, examples in their list of top 10 greenwashers. GE, what on earth are you thinking? I have been searching for good examples of companies that are delivering corporate social opportunity (profitably aligning brand [...]
Whether you sit in marketing, CSR, supply chain, HR or the executive suite, you’re likely doing your part in ensuring your brand “does no evil” and perhaps even is doing some good. You can probably point to a laundry list of company initiatives from employee volunteer programs, fair labor practices, cause marketing, cradle to cradle [...]
