In our last post, we saw that one way to combat the shift in values during the recession is to move green benefits to the back of the list, to match the downshifted values of your customers.  However, one "customer" who's moving green benefits to the front of the list is Barack Obama.

Of course, Obama is budget-constrained like the rest of us.  But at least with regard to climate change, he clearly "gets it" on environmental issues.

• On the campaign trail he spoke of alternative energy in relation to saving the planet.
• One of his first actions as President was to cancel as many of Bush's anti-environmental policies as he could.
• He put billions into the economic stimulus bill for clean energy and other environmental priorities.
• His Energy Secretary is Steven Chu, a Nobel-Prize-winning physicist.  (An Energy Secretary who actually understands energy!  Imagine!)

As the stimulus money starts to flow, some of it may flow your way — either directly or indirectly.  Obviously, this would be good for your business, and you would be wise to make moves to make it happen.  Besides that, though, is there any way you could leverage Barack Obama?

Yes, there is.  Obama legitimizes environmental concern.  On election night, he said we face the challenge of "a planet in peril."  And you can leverage that legitimacy in your marketing.  "The president has said we face a planet in peril.  Acme acne cream allows you to answer Obama's call to help, ensuring both a clearer face and a cleaner planet."

President Obama has called on all of us to help.  He has said he can't solve the problems facing us alone.  If you can position your products as part of the solution, then enlist the participation of your customers in answering that call, you can leverage Barack Obama to keep your turf green (environmentally and financially!) during this difficult economic dry spell.

Look for statements by the president about the environment that relate in some way to your own company's mission.  (No doubt there will be many more as time goes on, so repeat your search every few months.)  For example, search Google for:

+obama +environment
+obama +planet
+obama +green -dress -gown

Add keywords to your search that are pertinent to your own product areas.  See if you can find quotations that you can work into your marketing.  If you can help your customers join Obama's green team, you're doing everyone a favor.  (As we say at Brilliant Green Marketing, "Better for the planet.  Better for you.  Brilliant.")

How else can you adapt your marketing to the new green market as it suddenly turns a dangerous dry brown?  Read our next post to find out.

In our last post, we saw that the economic downturn will make people less green -- in effect, at least — in their values and purchasing decisions.  (Of course, when it comes to purchasing decisions, "in effect" is the reality.)  This bad news is undoubtedly not news to you, but it may be helpful to have deeper insight into the psychodynamics behind it.

What can green marketers do about this?  Before we can arrive at good strategies, we've got to hold fast to the right attitude.  Sure, the situation we're facing is bad for green business.  But what is green business?  Why are you green in the first place?  Early on, we defined "green" as better for the planet.  That means that "less green" is worse for the planet.

That's where we need to keep our attention — in how we think, and especially in how we communicate.  Nobody will care that your business is in trouble, but people still ought to care that their planet is in peril.  Remind them of that, and you'll at least catch their ear.

Collapses don't take turns.  Right now we are facing an economic collapse, but we were already facing an environmental collapse (climate, biodiversity, fisheries, forests, farmland — you know the list.)  The environmental situation was dire a year ago.  It was more dire six months ago.  Is it any less dire now?  Did the impending environmental collapse politely step aside to make room for the newly arrived economic collapse?

Of course not!  Economic collapse may have shoved aside environmental collapse in people's minds, but it didn't shove it aside in the world "out there."  So to the extent that people are now less green in their thinking, the economic collapse has caused their minds to become misaligned with reality.  That's dangerous for anybody — including your customers.

In reality, we have not shifted from facing environmental collapse to facing economic collapse.  We have shifted from facing environmental collapse to facing both environmental and economic collapse.  The fact that the economic collapse is already upon us does not make the environmental collapse any less imminent.  In fact, the environmental collapse is not "on its way" — it's already here.  It's happening at this moment, on an enormous scale.  It's just hidden behind an ever-shrinking facade of affluent appearances.

Nor is the environmental collapse separate from the economy.  In the skyscraper of civilization, ecological services are the foundation and first three stories, the economy is floors four through ten, and all the rest of society is built up from there.  When the foundation and first three floors crumble, what will happen to floors four and above?  If bailing out the banks is hard, try bailing out the ocean!

Most informed people would still agree that saving the environment is important.  But many would argue that fixing the economy is now more urgent.  That's the cognitive error we as green marketers must strive to correct.  One urgency has not displaced another; rather, the urgencies have multiplied.  Unfortunately, the human mind does not easily comprehend multiple urgencies, but that's a reality our species must now outgrow — or else (as Hobbes put it)  we'll soon return to a world where life is nasty, brutish and short.

In the end, even realizing all this, people may still make less green purchasing decisions due to budget constraints.  But the first step in stemming the tide is to help them keep straight in their thinking.  Keep them in touch with the planet.  Let them feel its scream.

Is that all we can do to market green effectively in the new green market?  No.  Read our next post for more.