The climate crisis is arguably the biggest single issue for businesses to address. Therefore, it was top of the agenda at Renew 2022 where industry leaders joined together to discuss the changes that need to be made and how they can be implemented.

Seb Munden, EVP & General Manager at Unilever UK & Ireland, Clare Shine, Director & CEO at Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership, Lara Naqushbandi, Director, Lifestyle Retail at Google, Stephanie Lambert, Head of FMCG at Meta and Anna Lungley, Chief Sustainability Officer at dentsu shared their experience and advice on where to start when tackling advertising’s role in the climate crisis.

Munden set the scene by sharing the goals for the industry. He explained: “The focus for the coming year is on certification for our industry”.”There’s a lot of procurement departments and clients asking questions of agencies and we want to create one clear language to have that conversation that can also be used as a way for agencies to mark progress and gain accreditation,” he added. 

Certifications are being developed by the Advertising Association aided by supporters across the industry and sustainability experts. Munden shares his hope that accreditation will be ready by the target of Q3 2022. Alongside this, the Advertising Association is focused on promoting sustainability as an award category and educating the wider industry. 

A shared responsibility for the industry

The panel discussed the wider role of advertising and how it can be used in driving forward the sustainable agenda. “The industry faces the challenge to be both commercially successful and responsible; achieving this balance is imperative to the success of the advertising industry going forward” explained Munden.

Clare Shine, Director & CEO at Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership, highlighted the positive foundations laid at COP26 and questioned how these can be built upon. She explained: “Business played a magnificent role at COP26 with the Ableman trust barometer showing the changing expectation of people; with 86% of people expecting CEOs to speak up on societal challenges. Yet, at the same time concerns around greenwashing are growing”. For this reason, the advertising sector faces the challenge of bridging this gap.

She continued: “The industry must step up to help consumers and ensure that communications are authentic, honest and align with intention.” Noting that the climate crisis triggers two responses from consumers; “utter panic or utter boredom” she shared her belief that advertising can help make the crisis more manageable. 

Maximizing Influence

“The advertising industry has deep insight into consumer behaviour and we can use that to either drive sales or drive positive change,” explained Anna Lungley, Chief Sustainability Officer at dentsu. 

She believes the industry has a critical role to play, yet noted while Ad Net Zero targets are being embraced and adopted across the industry internally, measuring campaigns is much more difficult. She explained: “We need to work with our clients to find new opportunities for growth, pivot their strategies and make sustainability more appealing.” 

She warned that the intention to action gap is huge; people want to change but don’t know where to start. With this in mind, dentsu’s focus is on supporting clients but Lungley emphasizes that the industry needs to work together to tackle the systemic challenges faced.

Change from within

Stephanie Lambert, Head of FMCG at Meta believes that the industry is facing a ‘trust challenge’. She points to the fact that “advertisers are the least trusted professionals but 71% of ad professionals in the UK are concerned about the negative impact we are having on the environment”. Those that work in advertising are also consumers and to maximize change, values need to be aligned. “Consumers are concerned but so are our own workforce.” Lambert continues; “The industry needs to step up, take accountability and match our concerns in our actions.”

The industry has the ability to make real change but to get this off the ground, Lambert suggests a need to challenge the status quo and ‘get our own houses in order’ first. Training schemes like that offered by Ad Net Zero allow employees to be educated and informed which in turn helps the industry to educate others.

Building brand values

Lara Naqushbandi, Director, Lifestyle Retail at Google explains that while it’s important to take action, sustainability needs to be embedded into an organization at all touchpoints. She explains “Sustainability is one of our core values at Google and the way we tackle sustainability is by asking how can we manage our own footprint? How can we maximize our user base to enable positive choices and how can we help enable clients?” 

Naqushbandi suggests looking inward at the tools companies have at their disposal and thinking about how they can be used; “Looking at how to change products we create like maps or search to let consumers manage their own environmental impact, for example showing maps users the most environmentally friendly route.” Small changes like this enable people to make sustainable choices in a simple, manageable but impactful way.

Greenwashing is a very real concern for consumers and to combat this authenticity is crucial. Naqushbandi explains that where “everybody is worried about greenwashing, we need to have credible values to build upon.” Consumers need to be communicated with effectively and this can only be done by “being authentic, meeting standards, measuring progress and being transparent”. 

The advertising sector has an “upstream influence” with an unmatched reach across the entire world; the climate crisis is complex. While the advertising industry faces perception challenges over its role in driving consumption, it is equally equipped with tools to drive change like no other.