Discussions about climate change and global warming are in the news of late, with debates and perspectives offered from all angles to the issue. The Copenhagen Summit on Climate Change has drawn a lot of press as world leaders are trying to find a mutually acceptable way of going ahead in the path of being responsible and focusing on sustainability as an issue of universal concern. There are two important aspects to this Climate Change issue: One, Climate Change is not to be seen in isolation and is the beginning of a trend that would set new rules for consumption, production and governance. Two, the major part to the issue of global warming is to be played out by business houses and industries, which have squarely been blamed for having brought things to a crux.

The New Marketing Message: The two aspects have deep implications for business – they need to be sure as to what their responsibilities are going to be and they need to adapt their approaches to the new realities of going about their job. More importantly, businesses need to realize that this is not something that could be done with lip service, with everything done in the letter but nothing in the spirit. And when it comes to actually doing things, businesses need to not only amend their ways but also create, tailor and present marketing communication to consumers and the target markets as to what the new realities mean to businesses and to consumers.

“Sustainability” is not something that caught the attention of businesses till a while earlier – and the implication of the term is that businesses have to shelve their age-old tradition and beliefs and focus on new ways to doing things. While the idea has been to produce as much as possible and sell all that they could till date, from now on and for a while into the future, the approach would be towards producing and selling things that would last longer than ever before. For instance, the lighting industry is in for a major change with CFC being the mainstay, bulbs which would last many times longer than the traditional ones – and LED, which is yet to be out in the market, could virtually be lasting forever!

Marketers must get used to the new way of doing business, where the game is no longer to sell as much goods in as little time as possible. And the next wave of marketing challenge would be to communicate this new message and yet retain profitability and market share.