Eight truths about marketing online in the green business sector

Running GreenWise, our sister online publication, has taught us many important truths about running a business in today’s digitally connected economy.

Here are eight marketing truths to share with you, to help you differentiate and grow your business in the fast-growing green economy:

1. Discovery is the key to everything – the fundamental and necessary requirement for an internet user is discovery. If a user cannot find what he or she wants, the internet is nothing more than technology. Ensure your content reflects the keyword search terms your prospects and potential customers are using to search for information

2. Unlike traditional paid media, the internet has no barriers to entry. It’s an open playing field. Therefore brand, size and purchasing power are no longer the competitive advantage they once were in business

3. Agility, integrity, authenticity, expertise and relevance are the new currency. These are the facets of modern day marketing that online readers seek

4. Publishing content that informs and educates is the new marketing and nowhere is this more evident than when it comes to green business and sustainability. Ambitious business owners need to integrate publishing processes within their marketing departments

5. Internet users are programmed to seek out specific information, and they will never be interested in the entire universe of content. Users come pre-programmed with interests that define the content your business has to put before them. To do this you need to put publishing at the heart of your customer-centric marketing approach

6. Non-media companies need to think like publishers, but they are notoriously poor at micro-publishing and content marketing. Their default mode is to broadcast messages in the traditional way, using the internet and social media channels to push marketing hyperbole out. Their crimes include poorly-written and poorly-referenced articles, websites with no internal search facility, a distinct lack of case studies, no video, no newsletter or sign-up and no blog

7. Non-media companies need to solve the discovery problem by publishing, curating and distributing meaningful content that informs and engages readers

8. The most worrying truth is that many green sector businesses are failing to get even the basics of helping users discover their brands online using content marketing.

To help you decide whether or not your marketing needs a revamp, check out our online questionnaire, and for every answer where you the answer is “no”, make a note.

As digital content becomes ever more dense and harder to navigate there is a great opportunity for marketers to reassert themselves by aiding specialist discovery.

Creating, packaging and organising content is the key skill we bring to businesses in the green sector. Whether you are thinking about content, or curation, or data, make sure the basics are done well.

To understand the value of content marketing view our short explainer video.