I do not have any ideas going in for what I would like to do the promotional video on but I do think that I would like to animate it as that is always something I have wanted to try. In light of this, I will pick a topic that I will be able to easily illustrate or generate iconography for.

intention of decreasing their environmental impact but do not end up doing so due to the brands false or misdirecting marketing.

 

Moreover, the environment is negatively impacted as the harmful activities of the brand are further supported by the purchases of these misled consumers.

Who is the target audience?

 

The target audience is anyone who makes purchases of goods or services for themselves or their household and seeks alternative options that have a lower environmental impact than its competitors. This is Gen Z and young Millennials in particular (Petro, 2022). I aim to use my promotional video to display that transparency of production should be mandated so that consumers can identify brands that participate in greenwashing.

How would production process transparency help mitigate consumers being mislead?

 

Consumers would have easy access to the details of the production processes of brands such that they could see and compare their environmental impacts, uncover any greenwashing and make informed purchases that align with their values.

 

Petro, G., 2022. Sustainable Retail: How Gen Z Is Leading The Pack. [online] Forbes. Available at: <https://www.forbes.com/sites/gregpetro/2020/01/31/sustainable-retail-how-gen-z-is-leading-the-pack/?sh=5421d8ae2ca3> [Accessed 4 April 2022].

 

This source examines how there is increasing brand scrutiny in relation to environmental practises and how this can actually discourage transparency of production processes by brands in order for them to avoid scrutiny of their practises. A phenomenon called 'green hush'. It identifies that transparency is the solution for eliminating greenwashing. It mentions a particular fashion brand called ASKET that uses the 'glass box brand' approach. ASKET provide an 'impact receipt'. I really liked the imagery of this provided that it literally lays out all the 'costs' to the environment.

 

 

This article details the evolution of greenwashing in corporate marketing. From as early as the 1960s corporation have been in tune with consumer values of sustainability and have poured thousands of dollars into marketing schemes specifically designed to mislead or misdirect consumers about their negative impacts on the environment. Many companies now days that greenwash do so via misdirection, promoting their peripheral sustainability efforts while their core business model remains extremely detrimental to the environment. 

 

A theme visible through this article is that often companies use imagery of happy healthy animals and pristine landscapes to represent their 'sustainable' efforts. This is imagery that I may be able to incorporate in my promotional video.

 

This article does an in depth analysis of how exactly transparency of production could be monitored and enforced. Putting regulatory bodies in place to keep brands accountable. Every stage of the production, consumption and disposal chain must be determined and analysed. Sustainability indicators and ease of access to information must also be put in place so that customers can both access and understand the information.

 

This emphasis on production chain, consumption and disposal provides a concept that the video should touch on in either a literal or symbolic way. I feel that rather than illustrate complete transparency, it would be more beneficial to illustrate obscurity to provide emphasis to the point of beneficial transparency. 

 

Chapter 7 of this book focuses on how to grab the attention of a viewer instantly. Nelson-Field states that the best way to do this is to break any expectation that a viewer might have. Ben Jones (the creative director at google) ran a 30 second YouTube add which was nothing but a blank screen and found that nearly no-one skipped it. By breaking the stereotype of advertising being loud and overwhelming, he triggered a curiosity in his viewers such that they stuck around to watch the entire add. 

This breaking of expectation also can be triggered by inciting unexpected emotions in the viewer, such as disgust or amusement. Nelson-Field also found that videos that evoke strong positive emotion are more widely shared than videos that evoke strong negative emotion. It was also claimed that statistically animals outperform many other creative devices.

 

In light of this information, I will endeavour to create a humorous scenario that sparks the curiosity of the viewer.

 

 

This article provides an insight into the potentially negative effects of humour when advertising for serious issues. Humour can provoke disgust in some cases when it is used to ineffectually communicate a serious issue, and in doing so make light of it. 

 

I will need to consider this given that I am attempting to promote somewhat of a serious message and I do not intend to cause offence where humour is used.

 

Weinberger, M. and Gulas, C., 2019. The emergence of a half-century of research on humour in advertising: what have we learned? What do we still need to learn?. International Journal of Advertising, 38(7), pp.911-956.

 

This article describes how humour (along with sex) is an extremely effective method for grabbing attention. Given that my target audience is Gen Z and young Millennials, groups who are highly participatory in meme culture, I believe that humour will be a preferable tool to use for my promotional video. 

I do not wish to belittle the topic at hand however, so any humour used cannot mock the issue.

 

 

This source examines how consumers are becoming more acutely aware of how their individual consumption can have negative environmental effects. Consequently they are more regularly making purchasing decisions based on the sustainability of a good or service. 

This article describes the uncertainty that consumers face in relation to information provided by brands as they often obscure information such as their environmental impact and production processes.

 

The screen will be completely dark to start with whilst playing meme music in order to engage Gen Z viewers and spark their interest. It is an unusual format to deprive a visual medium immediately and hopefully the music will spark interest.

 

 

The Gen Z audience has interest in promoting brand transparency such that environmental sustainability can be controlled on an individual consumer basis. A literal interpretation of brand transparency will provide an aspect of intrigue and ponderance.

 

 

The story will use humour via the inference of the women wearing the shirt with the literally transparent brand such that the scenario conjured up in the viewers head is one of her flashing everyone. 

 

 

The add will end on a call to sign a petition to mandate brand transparency and stop greenwashing.

 

The font that best represents this tone is Helvetica as it has a feel of authority. This will balance out the humour from the former part of the advert.

 

The colour palette should be #386641, #6A994E, #A7C957, #F2E8CF, #BC4749. This palette has the literal greens for greenwashing and a complementary accent of the red, to represent urgency. It is not dull despite the heavy message , in order to appeal to its younger target audience.