Sustainability Messages Amplify Marketing Reach by Up to 33 Percentage Points and Perform Across Political Affiliations, Finds New Research by NYU Stern CSB and Edelman

The NYU Stern Center for Sustainable Business (CSB) and Edelman released “Effective Sustainability Communications: A Best Practice Guide for Brands & Marketers,” uncovering which environmental sustainability claims are most motivating to consumers across wide-ranging demographics. Results demonstrate that effective sustainability messages have a powerful amplifier effect, increasing brand reach and relevance between 24-33 percentage points compared with a high-performing category message alone.

The NYU Stern Center for Sustainable Business (CSB) and Edelman released first-of-its-kind research, “Effective Sustainability Communications: A Best Practice Guide for Brands & Marketers,” uncovering which environmental sustainability claims are most motivating to consumers across wide-ranging demographics. The study was done in partnership with nine global brands spanning apparel, food and beverage, technology, household items, and personal care. Results demonstrate that effective sustainability messages have a powerful amplifier effect, increasing brand reach and relevance between 24-33 percentage points compared with a high-performing category message alone.

“Results demonstrate that effective sustainability messages have a powerful amplifier effect, increasing brand reach and relevance between 24-33 percentage points compared with a high-performing category message alone.”

The research, led by Randi Kronthal-Sacco, Senior Scholar at NYU Stern Center for Sustainable Business, in partnership with Edelman, identified the top performing claims across all nine brands and extracted trends to create data-informed best practices that all marketers can use to unlock the potential of action-backed sustainability messaging to drive growth.

“At NYU Stern CSB, we have documented the growth in market share for sustainable products, but we need that growth to scale much faster through increased consumer demand and adoption from mainstream brands. Together with Edelman, we have identified a roadmap for how to commercialize sustainability through effective communications – what to say, where to say it, and to whom,” said Tensie Whelan, Founding Director of NYU Stern Center for Sustainable Business.

Researchers partnered with R&D, innovation, sustainability, and marketing teams for all nine brands including Mars (Dove Chocolate), The North Face, Unilever (Hellmann’s and Dove Beauty & Personal Care) and HP, Inc., to devise 30+ custom category relevant and environmental sustainability claims for each brand, to gauge their overall appeal and ensure learnings could be applied across categories.

Responses and reactions to these claims from 2,700 persons showed a wide-range of consumers are attracted to simple, jargon-free sustainability messages that connect directly to them, their family, and the world immediately surrounding them.

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In summary, the research showed:

• Category claims are paramount. Consumers first look for benefits that are germane to the category (e.g., “tastes great”). Overall, category claims were the most compelling claims tested.
• Sustainability claims amplify. Across all nine brands, sustainability claims significantly expanded brand reach (+24 to +33 ppts) by bringing in new consumers.
• Top performing claims are non partisan. The strongest claims had no demonstrable differences across political affiliation, and were largely unified across party lines and age groups as well as other demographics and psychographics such as gender, income, education, and urbanicity.
• Sustainability is top of mind. All nine brands saw a sustainable claim as either the most appealing (2 of 9 brands) or among the top most in consumer appeal (7 of 9 brands), outperforming many other category claims.
• Consumers respond to perceived closeness. Best performing claims concerned consumers themselves and their family, specifically when sustainability benefits were related to the impact on individual lives, families, and experiences.
• Scientific claims must relate back to self. Consumers were notably less interested in the scientific reasons behind a brand’s sustainability unless tied to a self-centered reason to care or related to the outcome of specific action(s). For example, “reduced air pollution” alone versus “reduced air pollution for cleaner air to breathe.”
• Health performed across categories. No matter the category, consumers will purchase products that are made without harmful ingredients to human health and resonant claims such as “grown without harmful ingredients” or “made without chemicals harmful to humans/the environment.”
• Packaging pales. With the exception of 100% recycled packaging claims, sustainable packaging claims did not resonate with consumers absent an additional reason to care, such as “micro plastic-free packaging for human and ocean health.”
• Generational gaps exist. TikTok has an outsized impact on Gen Z as a channel of influence. Some claims such as carbon neutrality, greenhouse gas emissions, packaging materials, and waste also outperformed in this age cohort.
• Other reliable claims. Consumers also reacted strongly to claims regarding animal health, sustainable sourcing, local sourcing, children and future generations, and support for local farmers. In fact, leading with “local farmers” improved the performance of claims connected to the growing movement of holistic [non-industrial] approaches to agriculture.

“Every leader thinking twice about sustainability on the grounds of it being ‘divisive’ needs to know this: If you communicate sustainability the right way, it will appeal across political affiliation, income, gender, education levels, and age groups,” said Richard Edelman, CEO Edelman. “Sustainability is an amplifier and if brands embrace it, we can exponentially increase growth and trust.”

“We’ve demonstrated the commercial case for sustainability for mainstream brands. The sustainability amplifier effect is real and can help brands reach and engage more people. We hope this mobilizes brands and marketers to act and put sustainability at the core of business strategy, innovation, and communications,” said Randi Kronthal-Sacco, Senior Scholar at NYU Stern Center for Sustainable Business and lead researcher on the project.

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