Whilst the normality of traditional marketing relies on its power to manipulate people to buy things they generally don’t need, Chris Thornhill, CEO and Co-founder of ethical growth marketing agency, Growth Animals, does things somewhat differently.
His change of focus (more about that later) meant he began exploring with their clients how to raise their positive sustainability or impact-based stories, both as a means to appeal to customers for whom this is an increasingly important motivation and as a way to educate people in simple steps to make positive and sometimes alternative choices in their lives.
Which brings us to the subject of ‘sustainable web designs’…Once we have cleaned up our supply chain, taken steps to reduce your company travel, and maybe even gone paperless, we still all have to deal with the dreaded curse of the digital carbon footprint (the energy consumption of the internet is now estimated to be greater than that of the whole United Kingdom and overtaking that of the global airline industry). But what can we all do about it?
Here are a few practical ideas, to help with faster (and speed here is key – the quicker it loads, the less energy it uses), better and cleaner websites:
- Measure – The first step is to understand your site’s current carbon footprint. There are a number of free-to-use carbon calculators on the net that will highlight your present position.
- Videos – Turn off auto-playing videos (never mind the fact that they can be irritating and intrusive), reduce the size and length of videos and use them more sparingly across your site.
- Images – Reduce the size and quantity of your images – less is often better. Consider if your message could be better conveyed through clever use of copy or graphics.
- Old Pages – Reduce the bloat of your site by removing old or unnecessary pages. Consider combining pages to condense the message and reduce your site’s page count.
- Hosting – Change your hosting platform to one of the many that are now powered by renewable energy. This simple change alone could reduce your carbon footprint by 10%.
Implementing these 5 simple steps can have a dramatic impact on the reduction of your website’s carbon footprint, often without the need for a full rebuild. And, for those looking to take it further, there’s plenty more that can be done to further reduce your site’s impact, through areas such as the optimisation of SEO (Search Engine Optimisation), UX/UI (User Experience & User Interface), Fonts and Clean Coding.
If you want to ensure ‘ethical marketing’ is more than the usual buzz phrase, you need to get used to spotting, calling out and crucially, creating a culture where ethical marketing is recognised, respected and expected as the benchmark.
In the words of a very famous voice: ‘Integrity is doing the right thing, even when no one is watching.” – C.S. Lewis
