Advertising Matters 11.09.2020

ADGREEN LAUNCHES TO HELP TACKLE CLIMATE CHANGE

On Wednesday, our Climate Action Working Group, in partnership with ISBA and the IPA, launched AdGreen, a new initiative to unite the advertising industry to eliminate the negative environmental impacts of production.

AdGreen has been backed by adam&eveDDB, APR (Advertising Production Resources),  Havas, MullenLowe Group as part of IPG, Sky, Unilever and WPP, along with the support of the IPA, APA, the Association of Photographers, and ISBA who will be coordinating member participation. It is led by industry specialist, Jo Coombes with support from strategy advisor Tricia Duffy, and is a strategic partnership with albert, the BAFTA-led sustainability project for the TV and Film Industry. Following the learnings of albert, AdGreen will provide tools, services and expertise to the entire UK advertising production community from 2021, enabling all advertising professionals to improve the way campaign assets are produced for a better climate future.

AdGreen launches with two clear aims: to measure advertising production carbon footprints allowing the project team to understand which activities have the biggest impact, and to empower the industry to reduce emissions and to act for a zero carbon/zero waste. It will offer a carbon footprint calculator incorporating global carbon factors from over 140 countries, as well as specialist training, a renewable energy buy-in scheme, and later, certification and a high-quality offsetting scheme, for the advertising community in the UK.

Read more about the launch and the initiative here and to get involved check out the AdGreen website here. It has been covered widely in the media including in The Drum, Marketing Week, Campaign, Mediatel and More About Advertising.

MEDIA SMART LOOKS AT INFLUENCER MARKETING

Yesterday, the AA and Media Smart – industry’s flagship education non-profit – held a roundtable on Influencer Marketing with a host of leading industry speakers, joined by 60 guests from across advertising, politics, education and the third sector. Media Smart has a mission to ensure that every child in the UK, aged 7-16, can confidently navigate the media they consume. The panel included Stephen Woodford (CEO, Advertising Association); Dan Clays (Media Smart Chair and CEO of Omnicom Media Group UK); Stuart Flint (VP, Europe, Sales, Tik Tok); Tara Hopkins (Head of Public Policy, EMEA, Instagram); Guy Parker (CEO, ASA); Tracy Brabin MP (Shadow Minister for Cultural Industries); and Charlotte Williams (Founder, SevenSix Agency & Influencer).

Conversations looked at the role of both industry, regulators, and policy makers in influencer marketing; steps already taken by the advertising industry to improve young people’s understanding of this form of marketing; the political perspective; and what else industry can do to build better media and digital literacy on this topic. There was agreement that adverts need to be as clear as possible in social media, so young people know and understand paid-for content.

This is crucial in sensitive areas such as body image and protecting mental health. All parts of industry committed to work together to improve children’s knowledge and awareness of influencer marketing and branded content. Media Smart plays a crucial role in making this happen and there was wide appreciation for its innovative and award winning resource materials which, with assistance from its supporters across industry, are available to schools, parents and youth organisations.

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