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Recently, Melissa Anderson, Director of P.R. at the Wisconsin School of Business at UofW – Madison, invited me to participate in a Twitter conversation with professor Deborah Mitchell’s Marketing Communications MBA class. The topic was the importance of online social media to sustainability and green marketing. The Tweet-up at #bizpitch helped me collect my thoughts. Here are just a dozen ways I use social media to create a brighter shade of green marketing.

1. Fly-on-the-Wall: By searching appropriate keywords on Twitter, (“green advertising”, sustainability, “environmental marketing”) and then following the conversations, I can better understand the thinking and trends in the industry. I also capture quick links to relevant websites and articles, and learn what like-minded eco-conscious Tweeple are looking for. This way I know how and, more importantly, IF I can help. Plus, it helps me define the green community I want to engage.
2. Cheerleader: Blogging gives me the forum to applaud the best green marketing practices, (Like the Kohler toilet promotion) at least as I see them, and share those insights. GreenRaising.com is another good example.
3. Encourager: Social media gives me the voice to invite great companies to do better with their green initiatives, like Telluride Ski Resort’s modest participation in SkiGreen.
4. Boo-Hisser: I can also call out those greenwashers of the world: The “Clean Burning Coal” industry comes to mind, or StopNestleWater.org.
5. Advocate: Social media allows us to also become advocates for those in bureaucracies. Large government organizations often have important conversations they need to have with their constituents but can’t use social media due to policy. Water conservation is a good example, where towns and cities partnering in the Water – Use It Wisely campaign can’t always engage in social media. So the campaign’s website, that we manage, does it for them.
6. Utility Infielder: SM isn’t only about commentary. Being a resource for identifying and sharing cool websites like Coke’s LivePositively.com, linking to great causes like Brighter Planet and featuring their badge on my blog (look to the right), or offering useful downloads like the Earth Hour to Earth Day calendar for the easy things you can do in five minutes or less to save the planet.
7. Pollster: Where else can you administer a FREE poll and get solid, relevant information from around the world? (Take a second and vote on your favorite green website.)
8. Organizer: With free programs like TinyChat.com, you can easily gather your world and host a conversation on the green and sustainable topic of your choosing, inviting in experts, followers, clients and interested parties.
9. Connector: Sean Daily of GreenLivingIdeas.com uses social media to connect eco-conscious writers and help them promote their work through podcasts and social networks. Sam Davidson of CoolPeopleCare.org connects with their followers daily with simple things you can do in five minutes or less to save the world. I use it to connect folks like these with you.
10. Educator: Webinars are your digital pulpit to help educate and train participants about your work in sustainability. Once produced, your presentation can be re-purposed through a blog, as a free eBook, and with slideshare, to name a few. I have recently posted my webinar, “How to Reduce your Carbon & Hype Footprints” which was part of the iGreen Virtual Conference.
11. Enabler: Barack Obama’s campaign demonstrated that social media is one of the greatest enabling tools of all time. Take a page from his playbook and build community around your environmental mission, green cause, eco-conscious rants, or global warming march. You don’t even need a worldclass strategist and/or web designer.  You can start on Ning.
12. Individual: Is mass media dead? Probably not. But more now than ever the individual consumer is in control. As David Ogilvy once said, “Word-of-mouth marketing is THE most powerful form of advertising.” As a marketer of sustainable, green, and eco-conscious people, products and/or programs, consider yourself blessed to have such a powerful, far-reaching and empowering medium at your finger trips…for free.  There’s something or someone bigger than us all out there, and he/she may have endowed us all with social media as THE tool that saves this planet.

What’s your 13?

If you would like to follow the tweet string from the Wisconsin MBAs, search #bizpitch. Thank you Melissa for this terrific opportunity to work with your students.

Cheers!