What is Sustainability Communication? Is it different than ESG Communication..
MACK BHATIA
"Sustainability communication is a business strategy for companies who have integrated sustainability into their operational and strategic activities."
What is Sustainability Communication
Sustainability communication is a business strategy for companies who have integrated sustainability into their operational and strategic activities. It allows the company to tell customers, consumers, and other stakeholders on their business, operations, what you do and how you do your business using a sustainable approach.
It is a mechanism to let customers, investors and other stakeholders know that your company genuinely cares about the environment or other social causes. A big part of creating sustainable development in any industry is to show your investors and customers that you are really working towards your sustainability commitments. An honest communication certainly showcases your company is contributing to environmental or social causes.
The way we see it - “Sustainability communication is a strategic approach to engage stakeholders who either are looking up to you as consumers, or institutional investors with sustainability portfolio, willing to invest in you. It is extremely important for all stakeholders, but specifically for investors to know that you are truly on a sustainable journey”.
Are you pursuing Sustainability Communication or ESG Communication, or both ?
We get asked this question a lot – “How is Sustainability communication different from ESG Communication”. The answer depends on who are you engaging with. While Sustainability communication caters many stakeholders, including customers and employees, ESG communication is mainly meant to engage investors.
This is an important message and a core need of the investors. Keeping this mind, a genuine ESG communication profile can certainly engage your investors and in the right manner.
Sustainability communication is a generic term to highlight a sustainability strategy of the company. It tells customers, consumers and other stakeholders that a company is committed to pursuing sustainable development and is moving towards a more sustainable transition. This role usually sits with the sustainability leadership or corporate social responsibility teams (CSR) within a company. And the primary stakeholders are end customers and investors.
The target audience for ESG (Environment, Social or Governance factors) communication is very much Investors. ESG is a not a common term used among the consumers but is largely driven by Institutional investors who regularly look for ESG Issues that a company may have. Investors assess ESG factors, specifically those which have a material impact on a company. This role is very largely “Investor relations” with a collaboration with corporate social responsibility teams and sustainability leadership. Financial teams certainly become a part of the conversation to identify the financial impact of sustainability or ESG initiatives undertaken by a company.
See how we can help you with your ESG communication profile.
ESG and sustainability works in tandem to deliver on business value so you can meet your investors' expectations and drive customer engagement.
Alignment with your Sustainability Strategy
A company’s sustainability strategy involves a thorough look into both the external environment and its own internal operational and strategic activities. Communication initiatives should be very much tied to the overarching goals as defined by a sustainability strategy. The most successful communications are the ones which tightly defines the target audiences and develop messages appropriate to them. Delivery channels then get carefully chosen to reach the audience as intended. The channels for delivery must have a measurable impact on the audience profiles, and where the results can be measured – this results in a huge value.
Utilizing traditional channels is good but we highly recommend moving beyond reporting and investing into digital channels for impact, measurement and outreach. Digital channels are measurable and can be quickly optimized as needed.
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