Selling sustainability to the self

Imagine you're staying at a hotel. As you first enter your room, you notice a hanger on the bathroom door encouraging you to reuse your towel.

Which of the following would you find most persuasive?

1. A message reminding you of the environmental benefits of towel reuse
2. A message telling you that most other guests reuse their towels
3. A message telling you that most other guests in that room reuse their towels

In 2008 Robert Cialdini from the University of Arizona proposed a similar question to his study participants. If you’re anything like them, you said you’d find the environmental message the most convincing.

However, it’s unlikely this would happen in real life. As part of his study, Cialdini partnered with an American hotel chain and placed one of these hangers in unsuspecting guests’ rooms. He then monitored people’s towel reuse.

The environmental message performed worst - only 35% of guests reused their towels. In contrast, telling people about other guests’ behaviour boosted uptake to 44% - a tactic known as social proof.

But the best-performing was told guests that most people in that room reused their towels: 49% of people seeing this message also did so.

Rather than practical reasons, people were swayed by a social norm. And, tailoring the message to include a seemingly trivial detail (the behaviour of others staying in that room) proved to be the most effective.

But importantly, people failed to predict these effects.

A fundamental theme in behavioural science is the disconnect between what people say and what they do. When asked about purchasing sustainable products, people typically cite environmental reasons - a common market research finding. Yet, studies like Cialdini’s reveal that often, unbeknownst to them, their motivations are more self-driven.

This insight is crucial for TV advertisers as they navigate the complexities of crafting compelling sustainable messages. The challenge lies not just in promoting sustainability but in aligning it with the nuanced motivations of people. By understanding these underlying behaviours, advertisers can more effectively resonate with their audience.

So what are these behaviours? We’ve already touched on one - social proof - but let’s examine three further behavioural insights we can use to sell sustainability to the self.

Appeal over duty

A common observation in green marketing is the frequent emphasis on environmental claims. Intuitively, this approach appears entirely logical. However, strange as it seems, research indicates that this strategy may actually backfire.

Take a 2017 study by Bradley Turnwald from Stanford. He, along with his colleagues, ran a study in a cafeteria. Across a term, they picked a few vegetable dishes and randomly changed the names each day. Sometimes the names of the dishes were basic descriptions (e.g. “beets”), sometimes they emphasised health credentials (e.g. ‘lighter-choice beets with no added sugar” / “high-antioxidant beets”) and other times they focused on taste (e.g. “dynamite chilli and tangy lime-seasoned beets”).

The same dish with an indulgent description had 38% higher sales compared to when its description emphasised health, and 25% higher compared to basic labelling. Surprisingly, labels emphasising nutrition actually performed worse than those using basic labelling (see Figure 1 below).

Similarly, in The Choice Factory Richard Shotton describes an experiment he ran where he sent a group of consumers the same washing tablet and asked them to wash their clothes with it. However, half were told it was a standard tablet, and the other half that it was an eco-friendly tablet.

Those who used what they thought was a green tablet rated it 9% lower on effectiveness and likability. They were also willing to pay 9% less for it.

Emphasising environmental virtues can reduce appeal, as people often anticipate a tradeoff, expecting eco-friendly products to be of lower quality. It's generally more effective to highlight the inherent appeal of products, as with traditional marketing.

Consider Tesla. Their vehicles are not only electric; their popularity also stems from their appealing design and status-symbol price tag. Tesla cars are more than just an option for the eco-conscious; they are an aspirational good. This teaches us that if we aim to enhance interest in sustainability, we should focus on making behaviours inherently appealing to the individual. The sustainability aspect can then become a secondary, or even unmentioned, benefit.

Aligning with identity

Yet another challenge for marketers is how one behaviour or offering can be appealing among one group, but not another. We can’t change its nature. But we can change how we frame it.

It’s hard to change our minds. But if we position a behaviour in line with someone's identity, then we can make it feel psychologically more acceptable.

For example, ‘Don’t Mess with Texas’ is a hugely successful anti-litter campaign, beginning in 1985. At that time, the state spent around $20 million each year cleaning up the highways. The culprits were rebellious young Texan men, who according to one of the creators, Tim McClure, believed littering was their “God-given right”.

Previously anti-littering campaigns had tried to encourage an interest in the environment, with slogans such as “Keep Texas Beautiful”. However, these types of messages didn’t resonate with the target audience. So, Tim McClure along with his colleague Mike Blair thought about what type of language might land with young Texan men.

They settled on ‘Don’t Mess with Texas’ - it was a hit. It aligned anti-littering with people’s existing social identities. It drew on their state pride and machismo, saying things like littering was an “insult” and a “crime” to the Lone Star state. As a result, the campaign reduced littering on highways by up to 72% between 1986 and 1990. And it's still running today.

Today's marketers should similarly tap into more nuanced beliefs and identities. By aligning sustainability with individuals’ sense of self, you can make eco-friendly messaging more appealing, even to those typically resistant to green initiatives.

Political Affiliation

Sustainability messages often fail to resonate across political divides. Dena Gromet’s 2013 study at the University of Pennsylvania highlighted this by testing responses to energy-efficient lightbulbs among American participants. Both conservatives and liberals were likely to choose energy-saving bulbs when framed as cost-saving.

However, when marked with “protect the environment” stickers, conservative uptake decreased. Similar patterns emerged in other studies: conservatives tend to respond better to sustainability when it aligns with authority and civic duty, while liberals are motivated by broader societal benefits.

These studies were conducted in the US, where there is greater political polarisation. But anecdotally, we see comparable behaviour among British newspapers.

Historically, right-wing publications like The Sun and The Express regularly reported on climate scepticism. In more recent years, they’ve shifted away from these positions. However, Pawas Bishit from Keele University points out that the language they use is carefully chosen to appeal to their audience.

For example, The Daily Express now presents sustainability as a “green crusade” and asks readers to support the “Green Industrial Revolution” - a narrative based around pride and nationalism. Similarly, The Sun launched a ‘Green Team’ campaign calling on people’s civic duty - they ask readers to “play their part”.

Alongside demographics such as age, gender, and income, it is worth thinking about political affiliation. You might want to consider framing your message differently depending on what is important to that audience.

Prioritising action over intent

Ultimately, it's less about whether people are motivated by direct claims about sustainability, or whether they even know they’re doing the right thing. It's about whether they actually take action.

So consider how you can apply these principles to your next sustainability brief. What’s appealing to them? What do they find important? What language resonates with those values? Align with your audience’s sense of self and sustainability will become that much more appealing.

References

‘A Room with a Viewpoint: Using Social Norms to Motivate Environmental Conservation in Hotels’ by Noah J. Goldstein, Robert Cialdini & Vladas Griskevicius [Journal of Consumer Research, Vol. 35, No. 1, pp. 472–482, 2008]

‘Association Between Indulgent Descriptions and Vegetable Consumption: Twisted Carrots and Dynamite Beets’ by Bradley Turnwald, Danielle Z Boles & Alia Crum Boles DZ, [JAMA Internal Medicine, Vol. 177, No. 8, pp. 1216-1218, 2017]

The Choice Factory by Richard Shotton [2018]

‘Political ideology affects energy-efficiency attitudes and choices’ by Dena Gromet, Howard Kunreuther & Richard Larrick RP. [Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, Vol. 110, No. 23, pp. 9314-9319, 2013]

‘Getting Liberals and Conservatives to Go Green: Political Ideology and Congruent Appeals’ by

Blair Kidwell, Adam Farmer & David M. Hardesty [Journal of Consumer Research, Vol. 40, No. 2, pp. 350–367, 2013]

‘A Dirty Word or a Dirty World?: Attribute Framing, Political Affiliation, and Query Theory’ by David Hardist, Eric Johnson & Elke Weber [Psychological Science, Vol. 21, No.1, pp. 86-92, 2010]