How to develop a green ad campaign

Cynics might argue that the raison d'etre of the advertising industry is to distort the truth. Ad agencies would say they are simply " enhancing paradigms".

This grey area between the positive portrayal of what you are selling and outright lying was undeniably exploited during the early days of the environmental boom, as company after company sought to promote their newly minted green credentials. But the proliferation of so-called "greenwash" over the last five years has only served to alienate consumers and prompted governments and industry regulators to take increasingly tough action against those firms that overstate their green credentials.

The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has wrapped a lot of knuckles in recent years over green advertising claims which do not stand up to scrutiny. For example, Renault recently fell foul of the ASA after viewer's complained about its use of "zero emissions" in an ad for an electric car, while the long running campaign for a third runway at Heathrow has been pulled up for an ad which stated that the expansion would not "make Heathrow any noisier or dirtier".

Even the government has not escaped scrutiny and was rebuked for a series of controversial ads calling on people to curb their carbon emissions.

According to the Greenwash Guide from sustainable marketing consultancy Futerra, utilities have traditionally been hit with most reprimands by the ASA with car companies and holiday firms also consistently guilty of violating green ad guidelines.

But ultimately the report identifies the advertising industry and the newspapers and TV stations carry their ads as lying at the root of the problem. "None of the UK's biggest advertising agencies claim to have training or guidelines for their staff on what is a justified green claim," it states. "And none of the main publications in the UK who sell advertising space have their own standard."

However, the authorities are not only cracking down on misleading green ads, they are also stepping up efforts to help advertisers avoid the greenwash pitfalls. Along with the ASA, the Department For Environment, Food And Rural Affairs (Defra), has released several reports and guidance on exactly where creativity ends and falsehood begins when it comes to green claims.

In addition, prospective green ads on TV or radio can get guidance on ads from Clearcast and the Radio Advertising Clearance Centre, while the industry has also produced its own guidelines care of the the Committee of Advertising Practice (CAP) and the Broadcast Committee of Advertising Practice (BCAP) to help ad agencies self-regulate.

For companies considering a green ad campaign, each of these best practice guides are required reading. But boiling down this wealth of advice and rules there are some broad themes to look out for:

1. Loud and clear

Ambiguity can get you into big trouble, so the CAP and BCAP advise that you use specific terms and avoid words such as "greener" or "friendlier" that can't be easily substantiated. Defra goes further and warns against terms such as " environmentally friendly", "green", "nature's friend", "made with care for the environment", "safe for the environment", "ecological", "eco-friendly".

Defra is also currently researching consumer attitudes to words which environmental experts may consider obvious but could prove confusing to consumers. The results should be published in the summer. "Early findings suggest that people's understanding of many terms is based largely on inference and intuition," Defra states.

How copy is laid out is also key in print ads. Lexus was criticised by the ASA for an ad which claimed "High Performance. Low Emissions. Zero Guilt" in bold type while the text which clarified the claims was deemed too small.

2. True lies

It is fairly obvious advice, but companies need to ensure that ads don't contain any information that can't be substantiated. Intentionally lying is a no, no ,but so are claims that are not provable or are unintentionally false. For example an ad from airline Ryanair stated that aviation only accounts for two per cent of emission worldwide but the ad was deemed misleading because the specific figure for the UK is actually 5.5 per cent.