6 keys to boost sales via sustainable products (for real)

Salespeople educated on a company’s decarbonisation efforts are able to build sales arguments on that knowledge, allowing for instance to safeguard existing customer contracts or to acquire new incomes (1). Developing this behaviour is extremely important as it directly creates value from reduced corporate greenhouse gas emissions. Further, this solution requires low costs as it leverages your existing sales team and only involves that the latter meet and discuss more frequently with employees from departments implementing or having achieved decarbonisation measures. Creating such strengthened connections among the company enables to build a decentralised decarbonisation capability, an organisational key for decarbonising profitably (1). In case your sales staff asks for a better understanding of decarbonisation and climate change, then prefer individually tailored trainings (e.g., linked to individual sales targets and contexts) over a "one-size-fits-all" approach (2). Talking about salespeople training in general and not focusing only on climate topics, this approach could indeed make your company 1.3 times more likely to outperform your peers in earnings growth (2). Last, some selling methods might better fit the climate change context than others. Be creative and think outside the box to optimise the development of your greenhouse gas reduction capability (1)! Consider the loss aversion bias for instance. To sell better, it creates an emotional contrast by first making feel the pain caused by a loss to your customers and then presenting your products and services as the solution to avoid these loss and pain (3). Adapting it to decarbonisation means for instance presenting the loss of a friendly weather to your customers (e.g., due to climate change induced extreme floods and excessively hot summers) by reminding them the difficulty experienced these last summers during heatwaves and heavy rains. Then, invite them to imagine how they perceive their future quality of life when continuing on this trend. It’s now time to introduce your decarbonised offering as the way to avoid this disaster, particularly by comparing it to your competitors’ products and services with heavier carbon footprints. Now you’re ready to stop missing – and even skyrocket – the returns of your corporate decarbonisation! Need to learn how to succeed the latter in 5 minutes? Find the answer back in the Solutions Explorer!