Strong Marketing Is Essential for Energy Efficiency Finance

By Kat Friedrich
Guest Blogger, Energy Efficiency Markets
January 23, 2013

Marketing is an essential ingredient for the success of energy efficiency finance. But too often, finance and efficiency experts focus on technical and financial issues and underestimate the importance of marketing. Using best practices in marketing is necessary to drive demand to the high levels state goals require.

At a New England Clean Energy Council panel in Boston on Nov. 29 titled Monetizing the Savings from Energy Efficiency Projects, the relationship between marketing and finance came up repeatedly as a key issue which needs further exploration in the industry.

Reblogged from the Clean Energy Finance Source. Read more…

Social Media Can Drive Environmental Goals Forward

Sometimes a picture is worth 200 Twitter follows. That’s what Ceres‘s online communications director, Brian Sant, learned when he ran a campaign to stop natural gas flares in North Dakota. Oil companies use these flares to burn away unwanted natural gas they do not plan to save or sell.

North Dakota’s natural gas flares are visible from the night sky and rival major cities in their brightness. Sant circulated the following photo of the night landscape of North America via social media and email. The response was electric. Writers picked up the story.

A photo from Ceres’s campaign to stop natural gas flares in North Dakota.

Sant showed the results of this campaign at New England Women in Energy and the Environment‘s March 14 panel discussion, Social Media Success in the Energy and Environmental Sectors. He also described how he uses podcasts, videos and infographics to make data attractive for social media distribution.

Sarah Finnie Robinson, founding partner at Practically Green, talked about her exploration of the nuances of behavior change. Working with an enthusiastic group of interns and staff, she develops social software that companies and individuals can use to alter their environmental behavior.

Practically Green is building on the current wave of interest in gamification – making activities more like computer games – and integrating that approach with social media. The resulting product makes conserving water and other resources less like doing a chore and more like using Facebook.

“You’re not alone,” one of Robinson’s slides said. Robinson wants her software to engage people in communication, not just give them tasks to do in isolation. Based on the rapid expansion of demand for her product, this approach is certainly working.

Cindy Jolicoeur, vice president of Marketing Drive, used a different tactic in her work with the Mass Save energy efficiency program. She leveraged consumer interest in sharing information about deals and taking advantage of discounts to build the fan base for the Mass Save Facebook page from around 2,000 to over 15,000. These likes came as a result of targeted promotions and advertising across multiple media. Consumers developed a relationship with Mass Save and used the page to ask questions about energy efficiency.

“People want to connect with people,” said Cindy Hoots, corporate social responsibility account director at Cone Communications. She encouraged the audience to be informal on social media. Being able to respond on the fly is crucial, she said. She recommended keeping an unofficial FAQ on hand to use in response to stakeholder comments.

“Not all these stakeholders are friendly,” Hoots said. “Some can be a thorn in your side. Others may have an activist bent.”

Building relationships with stakeholders is a complex process, Hoots said. First, one needs to identify who they are. Second, one needs to understand their values and priorities. Third, one needs to learn how to reach them. And that’s just the first phase of action. One also needs to prioritize influencers, reach out to them, and offer them resources they want.

Hoots recommended two online tools for identifying influencers: Traackr and SocMetrics. These sites can give one basic information about the behavior of influencers and help one develop a plan for building relationships.

There are many ways communicators can engage stakeholders and build support for sustainable actions. This discussion demonstrated how Twitter, Hootsuite, Facebook, and other social media tools can support energy and environmental organizations in reaching their goals successfully. Sometimes, all it takes is a surprising picture.

Customize Climate Communication

“What is the main lesson you’ve learned from trying to target specific audiences in your climate work?” David Minkow, who edits content for Climate Access and the Social Capital Project, asked me this question recently.

In three words, my response is: “Customize your messages.”

Today’s media environment is a crowded place, dense with conflicting demands for our attention. In this climate, the messages that rise to the top are the ones with the greatest relevance and the most effective targeting.

Know your audiences. Read the news publications they read – even if you disagree with them. Understand the jargon they use at work and the casual language they use on the weekends. Find out what they do for fun. Become familiar with their values. Try to think the way they think.

One of the best ways to learn how to customize messages for an audience is through cultural immersion. Go and visit your audiences in person. Go out to dinner with them. Get to know their priorities. Learn how to establish credibility with their organizations. Work with them and talk with them as much as possible.

Then, once you know your audiences, use techniques like community-based social marketing. Find out what constraints prevent them from taking environmental actions. Address these challenges through concise and direct communication. When you talk about benefits, tailor your language to your audiences.

Don’t rely on messages about preserving the environment or saving money. These popular messages may not resonate with your audiences at all. To develop messages that work, you need to know your audiences and understand them as well as people in a small town understand their next-door neighbors.

Get to know your audiences’ cultural preferences as well as you know your neighbors’. (Source: Someecards.com)

My Writing Goals for 2013

In November, I withdrew into the snowy environment of northern Massachusetts to reflect on my goals for the coming year. I live next to a park belonging to the Trustees of Reservations, so bluejays and nuthatches kept me company while I wrote. Before and after work, I spent hours sifting through my ideas about what to cultivate – and what to prune back – during the coming year.

A nuthatch (Source: Terry Sohl)

I took a three-week vacation from Twitter to reduce the “noise” in my environment. Surrounded by the peace and quiet of the wildlife refuge, I made some difficult decisions about my priorities and commitments for the coming year.

• I chose to offer the services that match my personality, background and interests. So I rewrote the skills, experience and bio pages of this website – as well as my LinkedIn profile. These pages now show my commitment to working on writing and technology projects that have social benefits. They also emphasize my experience in engineering and fascination with the way things work.
• I made the difficult decision to close out my media relations contract and focus on content production – writing, website editing, and social media outreach. I gave notice to my client on January 2nd and am currently seeking a new project to replace that contract.
• Translating science content is very satisfying for me. The more technical it is, the better. Working with an MIT professor on a physics book earlier this year showed me that not only do I have the “chops” for hard science, I relish covering it. I feel confident promoting my services to academics and technology professionals. I plan to seek out more science-intensive projects during the coming year. I am comfortable working with clients anywhere in the United States.
• Although I want to keep at least one nonprofit project on my calendar at any time, I don’t plan to specialize in working for nonprofits. I am very interested in partnering with green businesses and universities and combining projects from different sectors. I recently signed up to do a long-term blogging project for a brownfield remediation business and plan to take on other similar projects.
• I’m in the process of retooling NetSquared Boston, the meetup I co-organize, to make sure that it addresses unmet needs within the nonprofit tech community. My leadership role in NetSquared Boston gives me many professional opportunities, including networking and low-cost computer training. I plan to refresh some of my web development and software skills soon to stay current with the state-of-the-art technology that is coming out each year.
• Although I was considering moving to Denver or Chicago earlier, I now plan to stay in Massachusetts for the next few years. I visited family in Chicago in early January and made the decision while I was there. Although I miss Chicago, there are many reasons for me to stay in Massachusetts.
• Finally, I have a resolution to take more risks with writing and journalism this coming year. I want to go to events like the American Association for the Advancement of Science conference in Boston, take the leap toward doing projects that are outside my comfort zone, and continue to experiment stylistically as a writer.

I’ve pruned back my commitments from 2012 now so that new ideas can flourish. If the flower that I am attempting to cultivate has a name, it’s a “science and technology writing flower.” It probably looks like this image:

Fractal flower (Source: 123RF)

Identifying and following my dreams was what led to my success in graduate school. After a year of freelance work, stopping to take time to smell the roses and retool my approach to my career goals was exactly what I needed this winter.

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This post won’t be complete until I invite you to follow me on Twitter and like my Facebook page.

Media Culture Could Use Some Shibui

What is shibui? It’s a Japanese aesthetic quality described by Wikipedia as a combination of qualities including simplicity, modesty, silence, naturalness, everydayness and imperfection. Objects that display shibui may be functional art. They often have gray mixed into their coloring. People can also show shibui qualities in their character or behavior. For example, someone who contributes to the success of a group without self-promoting is behaving in a shibui way.

In the world of social media, there is a shortage of shibui. We are surrounded by voices clamoring for attention. Some organizations advocate creating memes and telling stories to break through the noise. Many marketers use a “hard sell” approach in which they repost content often or email audiences many times. I’ve been advised by marketing professionals more than once to send similar emails to people five times to get their attention.

Branding is the hammer behind the nail of marketing. Personal brands are like armor, both asserting and disguising the identity of the professionals behind them. I’ve written about the flaws of personal branding here before – including how creating a personal brand can be challenging for people from underrepresented groups.

In this noisy and overly assertive climate, some shibui would help diffuse the pressure. Here are some thoughts on how qualities of shibui can alter the climate of heavy self-promotion that seems to be so common in social media and communications in the northeastern United States.

Simplicity is underrated in some circles. But describing things clearly, accurately and straightforwardly breaks down many communication barriers. Simplicity can help one reach audiences of different class, work and educational backgrounds. It can also help media-saturated readers relax and focus on the essential information one’s trying to communicate. In recent years, web designers have gravitated toward simple, unobtrusive layouts; writers can do the same with their copy.

Silence is a very intriguing tool for communicators. Pausing while conducting an interview can lead to unexpected revelations. Choosing what to leave unsaid is part of a journalist’s craft; these choices can make or break an article. For content curators, choosing what to omit is as important as choosing what to include. Advertisers are aware of the power of these qualities and sometimes leave their audiences guessing on purpose. Taking time to listen and watch what others are doing is important for social media managers.

Modesty, everydayness and naturalness are qualities that can win respect but are often ignored in high-visibility fields. Many people view salespeople and publicists with mistrust because they believe there is a lack of authenticity in their communication. In some cultures and fields, there is a real distrust of salesmanship. I grew up around many people who were influenced by Mexican culture. They told me modesty was valued relatively highly in their families and social circles. In environmentalist social circles, many people mistrust artificiality and self-promotion too. Eco-friendly product marketing often addresses this preference.

Imperfection is powerful. It can humanize people and organizations. Being able to admit flaws, apologize and learn from one’s mistakes can help one build real relationships. Brene Brown has written about how vulnerability and taking risks can make people more empowered. But in high-visibility professions, there can be immense pressure in the other direction – pressure to be perfect, have all the answers, and never have a bad hair day. Media can exacerbate this pressure. It’s impossible for a famous person – even a talented and well-known marketer – to look perfect to everyone. Striving for an illusion of flawlessness reduces one’s ability to connect with people on a human, healthy and real level. When personal branding is based on creating illusions of perfection, it contributes to this problem.

One of my New Year’s resolutions is to be authentic in how I use media and mass communication. This is difficult; there are many pressures in the other direction. But I believe that, in the end, respectful honesty can build credibility and relationships. High-pressure marketing and personal branding can have the opposite effect.

Shibui can empower people and organizations to communicate clearly and sincerely.

What Facebook Pages and Diamond Rings Have in Common

A recent article from NetSquared profiles best practices from environmental nonprofits’ Facebook pages. The article quotes researchers who recommend using photos (with or without overlay text), sharing links to other websites, and experimenting to find out what succeeds or fails.

Here are a few tips from my own experiences with Facebook page management. I maintain pages for multiple nonprofits and am perennially looking for new tools and resources to improve our content and engagement. Since many people are working on building reputations as social media professionals, there are plenty of publications out there on this subject.

1. Be inspiring. Consistently, my posts that get the best responses are inspiring. They may be visually striking images or inspirational messages that speak to the imaginations of my audiences. For example, one of my audiences includes people who are in a stressful profession. Posting tips on relaxation and mindfulness caught their interest.
2. Ask simple questions. Questions pique readers’ curiosity, but asking people to engage at a high level too quickly may discourage them. Asking questions on Facebook is like dating: would you bring out a diamond ring on the second date? Of course not. Similarly, with social media, you need to build rapport before making major requests.
3. Leverage your e-mail list and website. Use e-mail to direct people to your Facebook page by mentioning exclusive content that is only available on Facebook. You can also use your website to point people toward your Facebook content.
4. Have the scoop. What information do you know that your audience might want to learn? What resources are at your fingertips – or sitting in your in-box, gathering dust? What tips and ideas can you add to your social media content to make it valuable to readers?
5. Be newsworthy. Tie your Facebook content in with current events, major news stories, and local announcements that will be of interest to your visitors. Keep your content timely, interesting and relevant.

Dale Carnegie’s advice holds true for social media managers: if you want to earn the respect, interest and trust of your audiences, be a good listener. Don’t talk about yourself or your organization continually. Talk about other topics of mutual interest. Share other articles. Be a good conversationalist and social media will reward you.

My father could have been a great social media professional. He is over 80 and still does not have an e-mail address. But he is an excellent networker. He keeps index cards with the contact information of people he has met, sends them news clippings that interest them, and engages in long conversations. He does all of this by snail mail and phone after an opening conversation where he learns what their interests are.

This is exactly the same approach one should take toward building connections on social media. Figure out what you can offer your audience. Share stories with them. Develop relationships through communicating about ideas, asking questions, and sharing news. Add value to their lives. Don’t assume that your organization’s updates have intrinsic interest for all your readers. Make your conversation two-way. And don’t get out the diamond ring too soon.

“Will you share my Facebook page with all 200 of your friends?”

The Flaws of Personal Branding

When I was a college student, I felt free to explore different interests and groups without worrying about how that would affect my personal brand. Now, recent graduates sit through workshops like “Careers, Beers and the Brand Called You.” Although I promoted this workshop via NetSquared Boston, I didn’t attend it – for a reason.

Although I understand the value of personal branding from a business standpoint, I believe business values have infiltrated the personal and creative spheres of people who are seeking to market themselves. In some ways, this is a good thing; in other ways, it can be destructive.

You are not your image. (Source: stock.xchng)

You Are Not Your Career

Recent evidence from the recession shows that economic downturns can lead to suicides. The people most likely to commit suicide in Europe seem to be those with strong career aspirations – the upwardly mobile and entrepreneurial people who are most likely to engage in personal branding.

Think about it. If you are your brand and you suffer economic hardship, what does that say about your worth as a human being? What does that say about your marketability? It’s not a surprise that people who overidentify with their careers become hopeless in these situations.

I’m a fan of the Seven Habits series and believe that having a strong source of internal purpose and mission is important to career survival and happiness. This means that one’s purpose is not the same as one’s brand.

One’s purpose is like a compass; one’s brand is like a vehicle that gets one to the next destination. Building a brand is useful, but it is no substitute for having a source of self-worth that is independent from how one makes a living.

You Have the Right to Experiment

I had a long e-mail conversation with Bill Lascher last year about how branding one’s writing can limit one’s creative freedom. For example, if a woman who’s been writing chick lit for 10 years decides to produce a novel about the Vietnam War, her web presence will need a makeover.

It took me a long time to develop the brand for this blog. The urban environmental version of this blog did a great job of encapsulating my journalism interests. But it didn’t convey most of what I do for a living. There are two halves to my work – the freelance journalism and the work I do for established environmental, science and/or technology organizations. I updated my website to include both of these sides of my writing.

My interests are multifaceted and do not distill down into a sound bite easily. Luckily, environmental issues and technology are such broad topics that I have no shortage of ideas to explore. I have a genre, but it’s not a very limiting genre.

Still, even with this relatively flexible definition, I still am not my brand. In my free time, I do a lot of dancing. The type of dance I do combines martial arts, yoga, jazz dance and modern dance. There are many other things I do that don’t fit into my brand neatly either.

You Don’t Owe the Internet an Explanation

If you’re trying to maintain a consistent brand, you may police your online presence. This is an overrated activity. It is not fun; also, it can limit your participation in activities you enjoy because you are too busy watching your paper trail.

Idealistically speaking, as long as whatever you are doing is legal and reasonably ethical, it shouldn’t matter if it comes up on the first page of a search. However, there may be some types of material – for example, your memoir about your years as a bartender – that fall into a gray area. Employers exclude applicants based on evidence of alcohol consumption and may not appreciate the candid nature and literary quality of your writing. Appearance discrimination is also alive and well online, so simple hairstyle changes can become stressful choices.

The advice “to thine own self be true” is difficult to follow if you are a writer engaging in personal branding. If you’re a real estate agent who has never written a controversial blog post in her life, then personal branding is easy – get a headshot and you’re done. I suspect most writers find this process difficult.

Ironically, although writers are encouraged to focus on marketing and branding, authenticity is what fuels good writing. Being able to sit with a pen or computer and face exactly what one wants to say is part of the creative process. Personal branding can short-circuit that experience, substituting image maintenance for real self-expression.

You Aren’t in Charge of Your Image

Personal branding requires writers and other creative content producers to take a hard look in the mirror. Now, more than ever, we are subjected to the whims of search engines and online conversations. Most of this is completely outside our control.

Personal brand advocates seem to downplay the following point: as marketers of our own work, we are not in charge of how other people respond to us. We are only responsible for what we say. We are not responsible for whether or not people like us. If people photograph us in an unflattering way, that is outside our control.

In the world of branding and social media, it’s important to recognize that we do not control our images. We can create them and shape them. We can alter them. But they are a collaborative creation – and some of that creation is done by our audience. Studies show that people will misread much of what we post online.

We can’t hold ourselves responsible for how people see us; we are only responsible for what we say and do. In a world where people may not judge us by our actions, we can continue to hold that standard for ourselves and others. We can keep our self-images separate from our personal brands. And we can recognize image evaluation is a weak substitute for assessment of character.

How to Engage Online Communities

A recent article claiming that 84 percent of one’s Facebook page fans are lurkers raised an interesting question for me. How does one get communities to “gel” online? What are some of the tricks of the trade that help web communication professionals engage their audiences?

The ideas below are based on my experiences with organizing meetups, including NetSquared Boston; producing news content for an online community of graduate students and professors; and building the audience of an energy-related newsletter.

1. Make Your Most Important Content Visible

Journalists know that the first few seconds of reading will determine whether your audience reads the whole article or puts down the paper. Your title, subheading, and any content that is highly visible will attract readers’ attention.

Here are a few tips:

• Choose clear, attention-getting headlines
• Test your web content using the Five Second Test
• Think about the first sentences you use
• Choose interesting topic headings

2. Organize Your Site Logically

Take a look through a website usability guide and use those principles to organize your content clearly. Will a new visitor to your site know where to find information? Try to keep the number of levels in your site map to a minimum. This will make it easier for website visitors to find the content they need.

3. Use Your Audience’s Favorite Media

If you know how your audience already finds information, you can communicate with them using their preferred media. For many audiences in the United States, e-mail is still the best way to present information. If you make your content conversational and entertaining, you can also use Facebook to reach a large audience. Sites like Twitter and Quora can give you access to professionals in specialized fields like journalism and IT. Some audiences spend long hours on YouTube.

If your audience isn’t RSS-literate, they won’t subscribe to your blog’s news feed. On the other hand, if your audience knows how to subscribe to your meetup calendar, they may be watching all of your events without even being members of your meetup. Twitter users may add you to private lists without following you openly.

4. Build Your Niche

What does your website provide that other websites do not? Is your meetup unique, or is it the same as another meetup in the next town? Like running a business, running an online community requires that you provide added value. You should make your content easy to use and worthwhile.

If you have a niche for which there is not much demand, recast your focus so that it addresses needs that people know exist. You may be absolutely convinced of a need that others don’t see or recognize; this will make your job more difficult. I’ve seen scientists experience this problem often. Simplifying your message and making it convincing can help your website gain support.

5. Know Your Audience’s Priorities

Knowing the priorities and values of your audience can help you move your website into their “to visit” list. What do they need to know? Can you make their lives easier by providing networking or useful information? If your site looks like a resource library, you should work to make your content more immediately useful and action-oriented.

Some audiences dislike spending time online and will not surf in search of resources. Other audiences may own mobile phones but not computers. The more you know about what matters to your audience, the easier it will be for you to integrate your site or community into their everyday workflow.

Ask your audience what they want to see. You may be surprised. I used a poll in a meetup recently. I discovered – unexpectedly – that most of the respondents wanted to do outdoor activities this spring and summer. Because I did this poll, I’ll schedule the kinds of activities they requested.

Is Eco-Friendly Behavior Contagious?

Now that OPOWER is using social science to help us encourage our Facebook friends to save energy, I’ve become curious about the role of social circles in environmentalism. Do environmental values diffuse socially into the larger community? And, if they do, how can one accelerate that process?

Eco-friendly choices aren’t the only kind of behavior that may be contagious. Weight loss studies imply that people both adjust their size to match their friends and cluster socially based on their weight. The book The Social Animal says people not only mirror the facial expressions of their families, but subtly seek out partners and friends who mirror their own appearances and values. This mirroring and filtering process is both subtle and continuous.

Advertising encourages us to use product choices to express ourselves – thereby showing our values, interests and character to potential coworkers, friends and partners. Even being “real” – for example, going without makeup – can be a statement. So can environmental decisions.

Including social circles in one’s perspective can lead to intriguing questions about environmentalism. How do environmentalists find each other? If environmentalists cluster too closely, will our innovations diffuse into the rest of society? On the other hand, if we spread out into a dispersed community, will we still be able to change the culture around us? If we want our social norms to catch on, what should we do? Should we try to reach a critical mass? Should we look for tipping points?

The Smart Grid’s Grassroots Appeal

The phrase “smart grid” might intimidate some audiences. Do we want an intelligent power grid? For some people, the idea might be reminiscent of The Matrix or even 1984. Utility customers may say that futuristic plus costly does not equal appealing.

Defined simply, a smart grid is a modernized, efficient system of power equipment that is responsive to customer energy needs. It’s flexible and decentralized and supports local installations of renewable energy.

A smart grid could reduce power losses due to electrical resistance, but consumer resistance could still pose a problem. Fortunately, one of the main advantages of a smart grid is that it can support local self-sufficiency and sustainable energy choices. It also offers the opportunity to streamline our use of electric power. The cost isn’t trivial, but neither are the benefits. If you’re interested in charging an electric vehicle in your back yard, selling wind power back to your electric company, or saving energy to reduce global warming, the smart grid can be your ally.

The face of the smart grid doesn't have to be forbidding. Credit: somadjinn. Source: Stock.xchng.

It’s important to present smart grid programs as attractive to local stakeholders rather than giving the impression they are a top-down imposition. Smart metering programs have already suffered from a lack of customer-friendly communication. Because some customers believe smart meters benefit utilities more than consumers, programs have met with resistance.

Given the potential savings and autonomy that smart grid technology can provide, it would be disappointing if this technology was portrayed as a burden to utility customers rather than a new and versatile asset.