Episode 36: Sustainable Media - Investing in content and channels that support greener, healthier, fairer education and behaviour.

‘Advertising and marketing has an important role to play in doing good in the world.’  Agree?

Well we certainly do – and in this episode, Guy Jones and Ollie - co-founders of The Goodnet, a sustainable media organisation, share their story, of how a pre-Christmas zoom drink sparked them moving away from their roles at one of the largest UK media organisations. Following their passion and values led the way to them championing sustainable media - making video ads / display ads / branded content partnerships available to advertisers across a network of sites that all operate in the sustainability space, to inspire and educate.

‘If more ad spend and marketing money is going towards publishers that produce loads of great content educating and inspiring people to live greener and healthier lives, it supports positive behaviour change.’

We discuss the complexity of sustainability – and how for marketers it’s a ‘mindset shift’ that’s required. Marketers need to make some pretty big decisions about moving away from doing what they have always done to finding alternative ways of driving more sustainable practice. Not just with the media channels they select and support, and calculating the percentage of carbon impact of campaigns, but also thinking hard about the product / service / lifestyle they’re actually advertising, in the context of wider aspects of sustainability, relating to health, wellbeing and fairer systems for all.   

“We need to see growth and performance but in a way that puts people and planet more to the fore than ever before.

Alongside talking about the practicalities of sustainable media, we discuss the realities of greenhushing and greenwashing, regulation in the industry, and as always, the role and responsibility of the marketer.  Discussing how we build demand, awareness and by proxy fund the media owners. And whilst Ollie and Guy state that it’s complex – they’re clear that it’s a complexity that needs to be embraced and change needs to happen – change around the types of products that are being marketed and the types of narratives around those products and services…

“The prize is hundreds of millions of people living their lives differently and more sustainably than how we live now”.

Tune in, you don’t want to miss this – it’s a conversation filled with practical advice, support, ideas, passion and importantly, hope.

For more information about The Goodnet visit https://wearethegoodnet.com/

Our podcasts are currently being recorded purely via online conferencing platforms, we apologise for any minor sound quality issues.