GoodGeist
A podcast on sustainability, hosted by Damla Özlüer and Steve Connor, brought to you by the DNS Network. Looking at sustainability issues, communications, and featuring global guests from a wide variety of sectors such as business, NGOs and government.
GoodGeist
Effectively Good, with Thomas Kolster
In this episode we're talking once again to Thomas Kolster, founder of Goodvertising and author of "The Hero Trap," who joins us to discuss groundbreaking research conducted with the WARC consultancy.
WARC have analysed ten years of data around award-winning ad campaigns and their themes to look at how many of those campaigns were about ethical or progressive issues. The data-crunching shows that between 30-39% of the most effective global advertising campaigns have featured social or environmental messaging throughout the 2014-2024 period.
So far from being a passing trend, purpose-driven marketing has demonstrated remarkable staying power and effectiveness, which couldn't come at a more critical moment as brands face pressure to dial back their environmental commitments amid political polarisation.
Thomas unpacks why emotions drive effectiveness in this space, highlighting how climate messaging often falls flat by focusing on technical aspects rather than human stories. "Why do we always go down this guilt trip when we talk about climate?" he challenges, pointing to the need for reframing these narratives.
If you're navigating purpose in your brand strategy, this episode offers some data-backed reassurance that you're on the right track, AND practical creative guidance for the road ahead.
Follow GoodGeist for more episodes on sustainability, communications and how creativity can help make the world a better place.
Good Geist, a podcast series on sustainability hosted by Damla Özler and Steve Connor, brought to you by the DNS Network.
Speaker 2:Hello, hello everyone, you are listening to Good Guys, the message on sustainability which is brought to you by the DNS Network, the global network of agencies dedicated to making the world a better place. This is Damla from Mira Agency, istanbul, and.
Speaker 3:This is Steve from Creative Concern in Manchester. This podcast series explores global sustainability issues, how they're communicated and what creativity can do to make change happen.
Speaker 2:So in this episode we're going to talk to our good, very bold, good friend and longstanding DNS member, Thomas Koltster, about a new report that he's been collaborating on, published by WORK, the global marketing and strategy advisory firm. The new report looks at 10 years of reports on impact and effectiveness in sustainability advertising.
Speaker 3:And in case anyone didn't know, which is unlikely, Thomas is the founder of Govertising, the agency which takes name of his first book, also the author of the Hero Trap and, for our money, not sparingly blushes here. Thomas, the number one influencer on sustainable brands, I reckon. Thanks for joining us.
Speaker 4:You know, thanks. Thanks for the advertising. I think you hyped it a little bit too much. I'd probably be happy down at the number 100 or something. I think you hyped it a little bit too much. I'd probably be happy down at the number 100 or something. But I'm excited about this report. In fact, in these tumultuous, challenging times, it's sometimes good to play a jingle that people recognize. And one thing the marketeers want to hear each and every year, like our christmas jingles, are effectiveness, effectiveness, effectiveness. So I thought let's let's give them something they recognize and then sneak sustainability in through the back door. No, love it, but yeah so so do that then.
Speaker 3:So totally give us a, I think, before we get into how you managed to slip sustainability in like a Trojan horse, what's the background to WALK and the effectiveness framework? Just a little bit of an explainer for our listeners. How did this come about?
Speaker 4:what. How did this come about? Yeah, so that's a good question, because, in fact, I I actually didn't know that the report would show what we're soon gonna give our listeners a little bit of a sense of. So I had a, I had a talk, uh, with the, with the, with the team in can lines, uh, last year, and and sat down and I actually we just hadn't, you know, know back and forth. You know they have all this effectiveness data. What could we use it for? And then I asked them you know so, how far does the data go back? And they're like I think we've pretty much probably got a decade of data that we could look at.
Speaker 4:And so that's sort of where it started, because I had this idea that there's got to be a massive change. Because if I look at my first book, which came out in 2012, most of the research was done in 2010, I sensed a seismic shift in how brands went into this space, how they talked about social, etc. So I was sort of expecting to see that I wasn't necessarily. I was hoping to see that these types of campaigns were more effective, because, for some people who might have read my book, I had a very naive claim back then which was what's good for people and planet is good for brand and bottom line. So that was sort of like one of my jingles in good advertising written a long time ago. So that's where it started and I was very happy that they took up the challenge and wanted to help me sort of dive into all of this effectiveness data sort of dive into all of this effectiveness data.
Speaker 2:Well, when we look at the report, one of the main headlines is actually, it seems, that sustainability in advertising has become truly mainstream over the last decade. So what drives this shift? Is it a genuine trend or is it a trendy trend?
Speaker 4:Yeah, have you asked me that? Because I, you know, I kind of felt and this is purely instinct I kind of felt that there was a shift around sort of 2015, 2016, maybe even 17. 2016, maybe even 2017. And the report covers 2014 to 2024. And so I probably didn't expect that the whole decade would showcase that between 30% to 39% of the most effective work globally in fact had a either social angle or environmental angle.
Speaker 4:So I was actually a bit surprised because not, you know, and also in all honesty I mean, one thing might be a, you know, might be a trend and something that we all like to laugh at in the industry itself. Uh, but would this really materialize in terms of, uh, pushing brand love in in, in terms of, um, you know, building brand awareness, selling more? I I wasn't actually so sure, so I was. I wasn't expecting the consistency. That was the thing it was. It was like they go up a couple of percentages each year, but there isn't like a, there isn't a sort of upwards trend curve that I probably would have expected. That didn't show.
Speaker 3:It was stable and and that's interesting- I think I, I mean, I think it's a, it's interesting, I mean, I think it's, um, probably extremely helpful at this moment in time. I mean, literally, you couldn't have landed a better time. We'll come back to that in a minute, thomas, because, uh, I'm sure there will be a lot of boardrooms where you know, the. The question of purpose is gosh. Should we just put that? Put that anyway. We'll come back to that in a minute, the. The one thing I did want, before we talk about you know whether this, whether you're rescuing purpose-led advertising through this report let's talk about the themes, because part of the analysis in this report that's interesting for me is, you know, social issues. Female empowerment is named explicitly as being a theme. Fighting poverty, named explicitly as being a theme. Fighting poverty uh comes through as being a theme, and then climate looks like it may have taken more of a back seat in terms of campaigns. I mean, what's your uh sort of take on the themes that are being covered within these purpose-led advertising campaigns?
Speaker 4:I was probably not surprised, to be honest. I think I mean some people in sustainability space and especially in the climate space. They often think that our climates are all communicated, etc, etc. I looked at Super Bowl earlier as well. We didn't really see a lot of climate communication In this report. There isn't as much focus on climate, unfortunately.
Speaker 4:Yeah, female empowerment is sort of the big overall theme winner across. You know, is it in one or the other? That's not what I'm saying, but I do think there's a real opportunity for brands to look at this report and say what are some of those themes that aren't as communicated? Because we do know that younger generations and even older generations, our grandparents they want more communication around climate, they want to understand how they can live and thread a little bit more carbon friendly, and so brands haven't actually fulfilled that at this stage. So, yeah, a huge opportunity around climate, that's for sure. Whether that is sort of circularity or some things that are a little bit more tangible, I think those are some of the obvious opportunities and also, depending on the categories, we do a regional deep dive, also do a sort of category deep dive, so FMCG versus business-to-business versus banking. So there's some interesting insights there as well.
Speaker 2:I have a question, and Steve's question actually just opened that door for me. Last week I was invited to a seminar here in Turkey to talk about the communication strategies for the link between the climate crisis and the early enforced child marriages and the early and forced child marriages. So when we look at that way, female empowerment, social issues and poverty these are all integrated, and with the global goals frame we just saw how integrated they were with the climate crisis. So do you think that our communication and messages kind of miss the point when we're linking those things together? I mean, when we're opening the climate team only as a climate theme, then those links are a little bit behind the scene. But if we're talking about female empowerment or poverty, we have to talk about the immigration that climate crisis will and is now at the moment causing. So maybe we can shift the focus to that bilateral links between the climate crisis in communications. What do you think about that?
Speaker 4:I love it. I love it. Thank you for bringing that into the conversation. Yes, in fact, we're amateurs when it comes to climate. We don't understand that what drives great communication is an emotional connection with the piece of storytelling, commercial ad, whatever you're digesting, whatever you're watching.
Speaker 4:So we need more of that emotional impact, and I think behind every little climate story there's often a human story. I just read the other day that, for example, the shea nuts, the shea trees that are sort of like going across the belt in sort of the upper part of Africa, are now threatened, and that is basically just due to one thing climate change, but also just that a lot of those people don't have money to live for. So they start cutting down the trees, they use them for fire, for wood, for fires and then keeping themselves warm, instead of actually thinking about the economic sort of viability of having a tree. That's a production unit that actually pays them. So I think these things are intertwined and I think clever marketers would uh understand that maybe it's not necessarily the polar bear or carbon footprint we need to be talking about, but but there is actually some some real human uh stories that I think are very emotional, as we've seen sometimes when we look at the wildfires up in Los Angeles recently. These were the human stories, more than just wildfires.
Speaker 3:God, I think, seriously, damn that. I mean, do you want to come back in, or can I jump in Because I'm so interested in this? I think this is so fascinating because it just you immediately then beg the question okay, uh, are there certain social environmental themes that lend themselves to advertising more than others? And so do the creatives in the in the sand pit that is our industry, thomas, have more fun with them? Uh, you know, is the climate just such an epic buzzkill you can't bring it to life on a screen? I mean, is that it is that what's happening here, or or is it that fundamentally? Um, you can. You can sort of broadcast a claim around female empowerment and not bring into question the very consumptive lifestyles that our industry is anchored around. But at the heart of the climate problem are some pretty fundamental questions around how we live our lives and how we operate our capitalist economics. So I'm, all of this unpacks some really deep questions, I think, thomas, don't you?
Speaker 4:I agree, and I think this is why this report is important is, in fact, one thing is the report. The other thing is what can we actually learn from some of that creative that we look at? What are some of those common themes and how can we take some of those common themes and use the next time we go to our clients or when the clients are looking at this and and briefing the advertising agency? I mean climate, unfortunately, have been one of those topics that the industry have had difficulties dealing with. Um, in general, uh, I think some of it is just because there isn't enough education around it. Uh, in it in the industry, the creators that are working on those briefs might not know enough about it, might not know enough about the complexities around it, whereas when it comes to female empowerment, it's probably a little bit easier, because it's not saying that female empowerment doesn't have a backside. It does have a really serious backside in terms of the biases and the really unjust social structures that we still have in place. Even in places like the Nordics that typically are leaders in these topics, we are still not where we should be in terms of women in board roles, etc. So there's a lot of work to be done. It's just easier storytelling. There's a human face. When you watch a campaign like Always Like a Girl, that really sort of confronts the way we talk about girls doing anything running, doing sports, etc. Ah, you're not really good. You're doing it like a girl. Changing something like that, changing the language of that, is just a very powerful thing.
Speaker 4:But I do also think that there's so many things around climate where we continue to change narratives, and I think one of the things that you touched on, which which is really one of my sort of go-to things, is why we're always going down this guilt trip when we talk about climate. Why do Steve and Damla and Thomas need to feel horribly bad about anything we do in this world when in fact, let's be real, 86% of carbon emissions globally comes from the fossil fuel industry? Why the fuck do I need to feel sorry about the language but feel bad about drinking a coffee with cow milk versus oat milk, when it's a whole different thing, when the whole thing comes in all packaging and all that stuff? So so there's a lot of reframing that I think our industry needs to be doing, and I think a report like that can hopefully highlight and dangled carrot in front of people and say, if you do this right, people want to engage. These are tabletop issues that people want to talk about.
Speaker 4:In today's world, very few people want to talk about hygiene pads and the sucking power of a hygiene pad, but we might want to talk about how unfair it is that our daughters, if they go and play soccer, get paid a tenth less or 20, 120, less than 100 less than their male equivalents. That that might be something we could talk quite a long time about. So so we need to get back to sort of the reframing the narratives and make sure that we bring in some powerful emotional storytelling into the social and environmental issues, that we bring in some powerful emotional storytelling into the social and environmental issues that we bring, bring bring forward in the communication yeah, and you know what, when we're talking about our business, the advertising business, we always talk about the last uh product, actually the creative.
Speaker 2:But we have steps going to that creative ad.
Speaker 2:So the first step was, and always has been, the strategy part, and I think on that strategy part we also, as the creatives, have played a little bit on the safe side.
Speaker 2:I mean talking about poverty, female empowerment those are the safe issues that we can talk about because they are more or less acceptable in all parties and all societies. But when you talk about the immigration part of the climate when you talk about the economic change part of the environment, when you talk about the real impact, then you are in the danger zone. There are a lot of minds there you shouldn't step as marketeers. Also, the brands are hesitant to talk about those issues because they don't know which mind will explode to their face. So when we are coming up with the strategies, I think we also have to look to the field and then we have to find a safe path in the strategy, for our clients too, which brings us to the last product creative product and the effective, real effect uh in advertising. So I'm gonna ask combined with this, creatively, yeah keep all that in your head, thomas.
Speaker 4:Yeah yeah, I am, I am, I am, I'm still with you, I'm still with you, you are yeah, what are the most powerful or effective ads for you?
Speaker 2:but the second part is more important, I think. Who is breaking new ground? I mean, who is very brave to talk about in different angles?
Speaker 4:Yeah, you know, I think, if you look at effectiveness, communication in general and this is something that WOC has repeated year after year is emotional. Advertising is simply more effective in a B2C category, in a B2B category. I do think that why social, environmental campaigns as well are more effective is because they have that emotional element to them, and so that, I think, is a clear driver of that effectiveness. One of the things that's quite clear looking at 10 years which which I feel brings an interesting perspective to this whole research is, in fact, that you have certain brands who stayed the course. Sk2 out of asia, always, there's certain brands that never zigzag. They found their purpose, their their north star, whatever you want to call it. Let's not fall into that trap now but they had a clear position and they stayed the course. Corona is another amazing example of a beer brand. Where most beer brands are positioned around having fun with friends, suddenly you have a beer brand that actually talks about the beaches, about preserving nature. It's a very sort of clear position. So I think those and now we have the data to actually showcase that you have a brand that's been been honoring. This life boy is another example and and and then do that consistently. So consistency is extremely important.
Speaker 4:I think this is probably where, uh, that you hinted on uh hinted at a little bit as well the backlash against some of this thing. Why do we get this backlash? Because people don't authentically believe that the brand does this, uh to serve any higher purpose besides just selling uh chips or chocolate. The disheartening thing about that is that it creates a myth that people don't care about this stuff, and that's completely unfounded. People do generally care about the climate.
Speaker 4:There was a research out now with the Guardian and a couple of other folks called the 89% Project. That hammers home the fucking point sorry the language that all of us, and actually in the global south more than the global north care about climate. So brands shouldn't shy away from these topics because they fear that people won't connect with it. There might be right now, a political situation that does that some brands doesn't have the kahunas sorry again for the language because there's a political situation where a certain political group uses is really, really harming for some of these brands. So there's a risk around that, but in terms of connecting with consumers, that's a myth.
Speaker 3:Brilliant. So I want to come back to that. Where are brands at the moment in this sort of very, very disrupted political landscape? The emotional connection with people I think is really important to make of brands at the moment, in this sort of very, very disrupted political landscape, the emotional connection with people I think is really important to make. Do you know the other thing that, um that you you just made me think of there, thomas was a recent world bank report that a lot of people I know are taking the piss out of, actually, which is a world bank report came out saying, um, that 50 percent of global gd, gross domestic product, 50% of the global economy, is reliant on nature in some way or another. And people who understand environmental economics are just rolling around laughing going what is this 50%? So you're always telling me that if our global ecosystems completely collapse, there'd still be 50% of the economy that could still function.
Speaker 3:How illiterate are you and I think what's really interesting, I think.
Speaker 4:Steve, that's the hairdressers. That's the hairdressers. There will still be a need Service economy is going to survive. That it's ridiculous.
Speaker 3:If you choose to dig right where it gets. Really funny is that the big chunk of the 50% that are all over the place and and I I'm sure you've seen it, but I've been in so many sort of strategic rooms recently where people are just you can feel them pulling back and going. Oh, maybe we should go a little bit quiet on the net zero thing. Maybe we should dial down the kind of biodiversity campaign that we're net zero thing. Maybe we should dial down a kind of biodiversity campaign that we're planning to do. Maybe we should be careful about anything that's trans. You know, uh, looks at trans rights. So where do you think brands are just to extend, because you're getting into this a minute ago where are brands in that mindset right now? What are they willing to take risks? Are we moving into a slightly safe, safer zone for a while while they insulate themselves? What do you think?
Speaker 4:I mean, if you don't want to have effects of marketing, uh at all, and if you don't believe in effectivity, I think definitely play safe. If you don't, if you don't want to get get your dollars back, you know, play it safe. You know you can't be a marketing director, uh, if, if you don't go into marketing with bravery and creativity, then you might as well just go and work at a bank, right? Marketing and advertising works because you dare to do something that's different. You dare to do something where you stand out.
Speaker 4:I think, with all this popular stuff that's going on, we also forget some of the great stories. You Tesla, a brand that probably a lot of listeners loved, and many of us might even have loved the founder of that company, elon. And when you look at it right now, there's just numbers out from Denmark the other day, and there's similar numbers for most countries. Denmark, it was 54% drop in sales. So we also forget there's another side of the coin People who want brands that stand up for something that they believe in. So again, let's remember the majority of people still believe in these issues around climate, diversity, inclusion, equity, call it what the hell you want. That's still the majority.
Speaker 4:So, changing your marketing strategy because there is politician XYZ somewhere doesn't make a lot of sense. Business is about the long term. You build brands in 5, 10, 15, 20 years. Some brands have been around for 100 years Lifebuoy. Would you change your brand strategy because of a politician in a specific country? Hell, no, because that would create long-term damage to your brand. And so again, consistency. I think if you as a brand or a CMO right now is a little bit fearful I get that. I think a lot of us are a little bit fearful Then maybe just stay silent for a little while and then come back with force. I think that's the thing.
Speaker 1:If you're a little bit uncertain.
Speaker 4:Fine, be a chicken for a little while, but don't change your brand platform. Don't shy away from the topics that you have consistently invested in.
Speaker 2:That would be a very, very short-term strategy well, coming from an experience, because, even though the europe and the us have been experiencing this turmoil for the maybe I can say for the last five years up until Trump came and so on, now everything is shifting, but in Turkey we have been experiencing this for the last 20 years. So from experience I can say that there will be no safe spots to talk about if you don't stand and protect your standing, because today the women empowerment can feel safe, but tomorrow it won't if you don't protect your standing. But this is for another and I think, like three or four hours discussion, I have to come to final question and let's end on some optimism. Progressive creative ads can always deliver a feel good moment. One of the very first sustainability creatives, howard Luck, talked about making people feel empowered, not guilty if you wanted to create change. So what's the campaign that's put the biggest smile on your face over the last decade?
Speaker 4:You know, it's actually one of the key takeaways, or one of five key takeaways, of creative hacks that we put in. The report is actually centered around empowerment, so really sort of giving people ammunition, giving people an opportunity to have a say in some of these campaigns. American Express and other campaigns are in there as an example I'm probably going to pick, and, let's remember again, this report only covers campaigns that have been entered into an effectiveness award, which is a very sort of important distinction. So it's not all work globally, it's works being entered into uh, award shows, um can and other big ones. Uh, one of one of one of my highlights I have.
Speaker 4:I have quite a few highlights that I loved, but but you know, when I look back at something like reinforced alliance, follow the frog that was launched back in 2012, 2014, it's still a wonderful piece of work and let me just frame that to come back to your point on that, which is that not only does turn this idea about guilt and how hard it is to make the right choices in the supermarket because you really kind of want to save the planet, they also, in that spot, indirectly integrate all these other things that we talked about biodiversity laws, the sometimes, at least right now, quite contingent relationship between Mexico and the US.
Speaker 4:Women empowerment I mean the whole spot ends with the woman hitting the guy in the face. So it integrates all these quite complicated narratives around climate into the story indigenous people, etc. So for me that spot is still a showcase in terms of how you can tell a wonderful, empowering story that's super, super funny and still cover a very, very sort of complex, uh interconnected issue around climate. So go. If you haven't seen follow the frog, go and see it. It's amazing piece of commercial. It's going to make you laugh oh, I love follow the frog.
Speaker 3:That's the best. That's the best one to cite thomas. That was a wonderful one. We're all smiling.
Speaker 3:Now we're in a happy place yes follow the frog is a genius, genius work. Well, listen, um, we are out of time. It's been wonderful talking to you. I think people should a go and watch follow the frog on youtube immediately. B download the report. I hadn't thought about it until we'd had this chat, but I think potentially, if we all get behind the report and push out his findings hard, we can maybe rescue our little bit of the planet from the right-wing fascists who are trying to fuck us over. So let's do it so, tambla. Do you want to wrap us up?
Speaker 2:So let's do it so, tamla do you want to wrap us up? So thanks to everyone who has listened to our Good Guys podcast, brought to you by the Do Not Smile network of agencies.
Speaker 3:And make sure you listen to future episodes, where we'll be talking to more amazing people about how we can work together to create a more sustainable future. So, Thomas Tamla, see you soon.
Speaker 2:Bye, bye.
Speaker 1:Good Guys, see you soon, bye. Bye, good Geist. A podcast series on sustainability Hosted by Damla Özler and Steve Connor, brought to you by the DNS Network.
