That’s my obvious answer to Korey Baker’s question on LinkedIn today: “What attracts business owners to the idea of “going green”?

To give my position credence, just look at McDonald’s 2011 Sustainability Scorecard. Of their 13 stated goals in five areas, they only met one:

“Increase energy awareness and education across the System to continue to realize savings to the bottom line and benefits to the environment.”

While they’re making progress in other CSR areas, including sustainable supply chain, employee experience, nutrition & well being, and community, it’s no surprise that the big savings are in environmental responsibility.

As I mentioned in the American marketing Association article about the sustainability scorecard, McDonald’s wins by reducing operating costs, increasing net profits, and creating a story about their sustainability that they can share with the world.

That’s how you sell “green” to a company. What’s your answer?

It’s all about creative destruction, the fuel that propels free markets.

Author Tim Wu is a former tech writer from Silicon Valley who is a professor at Columbia Law School. This is an enlightening journey through the typical arch of American communications industries: From tinkering in the garage to a life-changing industry; from half-backed contraption to must-have production marvel; from a freely accessible channel to one strictly controlled by a single entity; from open to closed system.

Eventually, entrepreneurs and innovation smash apart the closed system, and the cycle starts anew.  Is SOPA the start of the natural constriction of the open web – the most verdant field for social innovators and communicators that we have know in our lifetime – and a natural continuation of the cycle? Will a resurgent AT&T eventually capture T-Mobile to expand their empire and once again monopolize telecommunications, another revolution in its cycle?

One of the interesting themes that threads throughout The Master Switch is the Marxist concept of ”Creative Destruction,” popularized and applied by Austrian-American economist Joseph Schumpeter during the early to mid 1900′s. The free markets are based on creative destruction, the invention/birth, maturity and destruction of a product, service or industry, its demise caused by similar innovation that created it. Often, according to Wu, the inadvertent self-destruction of the successful endeavor that has reached the masses is at the hands of its creators whom go from risk-taking inventor to risk-adverse monolithic corporation or cartel that becomes vulnerable to individuals innovating. David falls Goliath.

“All knowledge and habit once acquired becomes as firmly rooted in ourselves as a railway embankment in the earth. The very nature of fixed habits of thinking, their energy-saving function, is founded upon the fact that they have become subconscious, that they yield their results automatically and are proof against criticism and even against contradiction by individual facts.”  - Schumpeter

As a green marketer, you are a storyteller for sustainability. You have the master switch; the megaphone to reach your customers and stakeholders. You are also the innovator and risk-taker fighting the good fight against the mindset of, “That’s the way we’ve always done it.” I believe we are all still pioneering and learning how to make sustainability work. We must be the fearless inventors tinkering in our sustainability garages and continuing to challenge the status quo. We are at the very beginning of the cycle. It’s an exciting time, and one we are privileged to be part of.

Read The Master Switch and see how the rise and fall of these communication innovators and empires directly parallel the rise of green marketing and sustainability within our firms and the public conscious.

Can you share an example of creative destruction in your experience with green marketing and sustainability?

It’s not. It’s making fun of companies and brands that are eager to jump on the green bandwagon without doing their homework. Their green marketing shortcuts are laughable, diminishing the credibility of the entire green marketing industry.

At least Lorna Li of Green Marketing TV appreciates my humor. She recently invited me on her web TV show to discuss the art of green marketing.

The Art of Green Marketing for Sustainable Brands – Park Howell, Park & Co from Green Marketing TV on Vimeo.

In this interview we cover:

• Which companies tell their sustainability story well, without the hackneyed green marketing cliches
• Big brands that are failing the “got green?” test
• Successful examples of green marketing
• Egregious examples of green wash, in products that have no business calling themselves green
• Whether green marketing is really dead and if we should just give up

This revealing discussion with several real world green marketing examples, ought to help you better define your green marketing strategies and bring you closer to becoming a remarkable sustainable brand.

GoGreen Conference at the Phoenix Convention Center

Do you think you have your green brand and marketing figured out? Do you want to put it to the test? Join me as I moderate the workshop, Green Marketing & Branding: Creating Behavior Change during the inaugural GoGreen Conference at the Phoenix Convention Center this Tuesday, November 15.

GoGreen Conference Phoenix has a terrific lineup of speakers, including:

• Al Halvorsen, Senior Director of Environmental Sustainability, Frito-Lay North America
• Derrick Hall, CEO of the Arizona Diamondbacks
• Phoenix Mayor, Phil Gordon
• Kevin Tuerff, President, Enviromedia

There is no real donation involved – presenting something as a gift, grant or contribution – although the for-profit entity that hoodwinks you out of your items would like you to think so.

Inside Edition just aired this story on Bruce Binler, a Long Island, NY businessman who owns hundreds of clothing bins that masquerade as non-profit collection points. It is despicable that they can intercept your donated items for their own gain that would otherwise help put people back to work, as in the case of Goodwill of Central Arizona.

Since the for-profit collection bins have appeared in Arizona, Goodwill of Central Arizona has seen its volume of donated items drop by 40 percent, from 130 pounds-per-donor to approximately 72 pounds. With foresight, Goodwill has increased its number of donors; they’re just dropping off substantially fewer items per trip.

If Goodwill had not experienced the drop in per-donor volume, they could be serving 70,000 Arizonans, instead of the admirable 35,000 they currently serve, to help find jobs. Goodwill attributes much of this loss to for-profit bins.

More than 5,000 profit-seeking bins dot the vacant corners and parking lots of the Valley of the Sun, often illegally because they appear in the dead of night without the permission of the property owner. They are here to compete with legitimate non-profit organizations for your valuable castoffs. But unless these bins have a reputable nonprofit prominently displayed on them, like Goodwill, Valley Big Brothers and Big Sisters, St. Vincent De Paul, or the Salvation Army, you can bet your donated items are headed to a bulk buyer and sold out-of-state or overseas. Very little of the money from your once beloved items will remain in the local community to help put people back to work. It goes to men like Mr. Binler.

Donation bins, like this one from Campus California, have come under fire.

But he’s not alone. Other organizations, like Campus California, which has come under intense scrutiny in the Bay Area, are doling out 200 “cause-oriented” collection bins throughout Arizona.

It’s no wonder that competition for your resale items has gotten nasty. According to the Association of Resale Professionals, resale is a multi-billion dollar a year industry that has grown by seven percent each of the last two years.

Profits are driving unscrupulous marketeers to invade the historical retail domain of non-profits and pirate your items with the false promise that they will have a significant impact on an important social cause.

So the next time that collection bin slams shut on your donated items, think again where it actually might be headed and who is truly benefitting.

Great Lakes Brewing Company sources its ingredients locally to green its operations

But there’s hope and help for the Coal Burgers of the world. Entrepreneur Magazine, in its November issue, features an article on the five-step guide to marketing a green business called: Selling Green. They called me as a source for their piece the day after I wrote about Coal Burger, so the information was top-of-mind. Here are writer Matt Villano’s five steps to green marketing that he culled from his interviews with marketers and business owners across the country.

1. See What Your Customers Want – Do they even care if you’re green? Bardessono, a luxury hotel and spa in Yountville, CA, made this mistake.
2. Define What Green Means to You – Green has many nebulous meanings to consumers and proprietors alike. Ava Anderson does a nice job of explaining what being natural means in their non-toxic personal care items.
3. Connect the Dots – Answer consumers’ questions: Does it work? Is it good for my budget, my family, and our planet?
4. Practice What You Preach – Are you backing up your green position with sustainable actions that matter? Green Apple Cleaners in New York walk the talk.
5. Reinvest in the Community – The old think globally, act locally adage. Great Lakes Brewing Company in Cleveland only sources its ingredients locally.

The article is filled with case studies that demonstrate each of the five steps to marketing yourself as green. However, I’d like to remind you that being green isn’t so much about your marketing as it is about your philosophy and action. Being sustainable should be a natural bi-product of how you approach your business with planetary efficiency and healthy products as your highest priorities. That’s when your green story starts to get really interesting.

Do you have a favorite company that is doing its green marketing well? Please let us know below.

Since his passing, everyone has focused on what Steve Jobs seemingly single-handedly achieved at Apple. Sure he was a brilliant heavy-handed tech entrepreneur. But what hasn’t been talked about much are all of the people he educated, motivated and inspired within Apple who are now innovating in their next lives outside of Apple.

Matt Rogers, Founder & VP of Engineering for Nest, the creators of the learning thermostat, is one example. He has created a thermostat that learns from you, when you come and go, and how hot or cold you like the place. Plus, it’s beautiful; an ipod-like puck that is as much of a fashion statement on your wall as your Apple mobile device is in your hand.

Finally, someone in the energy world is thinking different about how to make controlling your environment and energy costs much more user friendly, a very Apple-esque concept.

I reserved mine.

The first Park&Co office, circa 1995

Our youngest son, Caedon, used to trot out to the back shed/my first office, cup his hands around his face and press it firmly to the locked French door looking for me, persistently calling, “Dad, daad, daaad…” He’d want to throw the ball, or help finding the cat. His visits typically came when I was on the phone with a client putting out some raging fire, not that I had many of either.

If you’re a freelance creative consultant working from home, you know the drill. But what was more frustrating for me than a 3-year-old clamoring in and out of my business day were the quiet times when there was no one around to bounce off ideas. It got lonely.

Now, 16 years later, with Caed towering at six-foot-three and about to graduate from high school, we have a new creative campus of our own to share with the world. Perhaps your world.

We have just opened CoLab, a 1,500 square foot shared space for creatives and communication consultants who yearn for a more inspirational environment than working from the kitchen table in plaid pajamas. We welcome the pajamas, and anyone who is interested in a true creative coalescence between Park&Co and fellow CoLab professionals.

Two private offices and five open creative pods are currently available. And the space includes a large shared conference room, kitchenette, great storage, and a view of Camelback Mountain. Plus a host of other amenities.

It’s first-come-first-served. So if the only creative collaboration you’re getting these days working from home is talking to your Popeye pencil holder and wiping Coco-Puffs from the chin of your toddler, come see us at CoLab. We’d love to add your spark to the place. Contact us here for a tour.

The Park&Co Creative Campus and home to CoLab at 44th & Indian School Rd., Phoenix

On-hold messages are the last bastion of truly disruptive marketing. Right? So we decided to make ours more than meaningless blather about our agency and services.

We enlisted amateur and/or street musicians to submit Park&Co jingles in a variety of musical genres.  We immediately began spreading the word among our many social channels. (There may have been a carrier pigeon involved—it’s all such a blur now.)

The one rule was that the composers had to base their lyrics on content found on our website. With this as their inspiration, surely they could mix, mash and harmonize their way to an on-hold hit. A reward of $100 was offered for each song selected.

Within a few weeks, we had several submissions that blew us away.  The Beggar Folk, all the way from Lancaster, Pennsylvania, sent us a sweet song that made us feel like we were holding hands in a coffee shop with Karen Carpenter. As their name implies, they’re a folksy singer-songwriter band. What their name doesn’t tell you is that this duo (Josh and Trista Lamb) oozes with raw talent. The Beggar Folk crooned away about our process of getting to know the client and their story. Listen to their tranquil melody here.

Our second selection came from Phoenix local Matt King. Matt is a rock star, at least in our eyes. By day, he masquerades as a hospital ER CT technician (we don’t know what it is either, but it sounds impressive), but by night, his true composer reveals itself in the form of funky beats. Not only is he a lyrical genius, he also manages to channel a reluctant Barry White. Listen to Matt’s smooth stylings here.

This process of opening up our new on-hold message to anyone who wanted to take a shot at it provided us with countless laughs and some amazingly original compositions.

I’m working on a little ditty called, “Honey Bucket Blues.” We’ve named our server “Honey Bucket,” if you’re wondering about my inspiration.

Got a tune? We’d love to add you to our on-hold balladeers.

“We just got another $5 donation for prostate cancer.”

“Oh no,” I thought. I’m going to be guilted into giving to another cause as I check out with my Lloyd’s barbeque ribs, Kraft mac-and-glue, and Coors Light.

“Just got a $5 contribution for prostate care,” another checker chimed in for the entire store to hear. All told, while I shopped for about 15 minutes, Safeway raised around $60 in shopper donations. My initial annoyance of the pending “Ask” began to thaw into more of a sense of community. As I heard the one, three and five dollar amounts shouted out, I felt the growing need to participate.

Socialization is one of the primary drivers in game theory

Safeway’s donation drive was nothing more than a game it was playing with its shoppers, while doing something great for the community. But could it have been more effective?

I just finished the book, “Game-based Marketing: Inspire customer loyalty through rewards, challenges, and contests” by Gabe Zichermann and Joseline Linder. Having attended Gabe’s gamification workshop at the recent Sustainable Brands Conference, in Monterey, CA, I’ve been fascinated by game dynamics in creating real and lasting behavior change.

As the book reveals, we are constantly playing games. Sometimes we even participate without knowing (See the “Naive Player” description in the book), with everything from frequent flyer miles, to currying favor with a Starbucks barista, to customer loyalty programs like Safeway’s Club Card.

Safeway deployed a small set of social game dynamics in its prostate fundraiser, but I think they could’ve created an immensely more compelling game with a few added twists.

First, Safeway’s primary strategy focused on the “Socializers,” one of the four primary archetypes of gamers, which comprises approximately 80% of all game players, according to Zichermann. People play to be social, and winning is secondary. In the case of the prostate drive, the sense of winning comes in making a donation that is cajoled out of you by announcing the donations being made real time by your fellow shoppers (The social side of their game).

Five ways they could’ve made the game more fun

However, it seems they could’ve amplified their success by also using the four primary motivational constructs of gaming: leaderboards, points, badges and challenges.

1. Leaderboards: Since I’m a Club Card member, why didn’t they ask for permission to announce not just my contribution but my name to the store? Sure, some folks will want to give anonymously. But if game theory tells us anything, it’s that people crave recognition for their achievements and good deeds. Plus, it would personalize the exchange and make the overall “Ask” even stronger to the next shopper.
2. An electronic leaderboard promoting the names of the contributors could have also been positioned at the exits to acknowledge their gifts and alert sweaty incoming shoppers that they are entering an important game currently in play.
3. Points: Safeway built three levels into this particular game – $1, $3 and $5 contributions. So the shopper personally levels up depending on which contribution they choose to make, and presumably gets an increasing level of self gratification depending on which denomination they choose. I felt better about my $5 contribution than if had I given less. Safeway missed a great opportunity to give coupons of varying degrees, depending on the level, to thank the shopper for playing.
4. Badges: Along with the coupon, Safeway could have also attached a brightly colored yellow, green or blue thank you sticker to the shopper’s bag signifying which level you belong to. It’s an atta-boy-or-girl that provides a demonstrable thank you and ignites the curiosity of the shopper behind you leading to the conversation about their contribution.
5. Challenges: Finally, I’m wondering if Safeway could’ve added an internal challenge by marking random products with the prostate game sticker and providing a $10 contribution in the name of the shoppers that happen to have it in their basket at checkout. This is the kind of designed serendipity that adds an element of surprise and reward to make the game more intriguing. As shoppers look for the stickers, they are culling through other merchandise that will illicit the spontaneous purchase they might not otherwise had considered.

The game inside the game seemed to be blowing up

In addition to the shoppers, it appeared that the checkers were competing with each other for the amount of contributions they secured from shoppers. But it was awkward. The poor guy that rang up my groceries was being badgered by what appeared to be an assistant manager, another checker and a bag boy, to make sure he was playing their internal game. They kept asking him in front of me and those in our line about how many donations he had tallied, and how was his dollar amount? You could tell he was NOT into the game, and I felt badly for him.

I’m curious how management structured this secondary game of checker competition, because it clearly wasn’t resonating with this player. It underscored another important element in Zichermann’s book about how critical is competition compared to other social dynamics? It turns out, competition is NOT the most important motivator in creating a compelling game.

I do believe that gamification is gaining a growing influence on marketing and behavior change, and that we’re entering a whole new realm of ways to reach and engage customers. So pay attention to the games that you’re participating in over the next few days. I bet you’ll find that you’re a pawn in a game or two that you didn’t even realize is underway.

Let me know how you fare.