Article updated 13 October 2026.
A sustainability team has the figures. Operations knows what changed. Leadership wants an announcement, and marketing has been asked to prepare it.
Then the questions start. Which figures can be published? Does the result cover the whole business or one site? Who needs to check the headline?
These are practical communications decisions. Leaving them until the final draft creates avoidable work and sometimes results in claims nobody is comfortable approving.
Sustainability marketing needs a process that brings the right people in early. This guide explains how to agree on responsibilities, develop messages, review the evidence and keep ESG communications accurate as plans and results change.
What sustainability marketing means in practice.
Sustainability marketing considers a business’s environmental and social impacts, along with the governance practices that guide its decisions, when it develops, positions, and promotes its products or services. It connects what the business offers and communicates with how it operates, treats people and takes responsibility for its actions.
This article focuses on sustainability and ESG communications: explaining environmental, social, and governance activities to customers, employees, business partners, and other audiences, with evidence to support what is said.
That work can include website copy, leadership messages, campaign materials, employee communications and explanations of published results.
Governance also deserves attention in the content itself. You might explain who oversees sustainability targets, how you enforce supplier standards, or how employees can raise concerns. Our guide to communicating governance clearly explores these subjects in more detail.
The challenge is deciding what each audience needs to understand while preserving the message’s facts. A procurement team reviewing supplier standards needs different detail and information than employees reading about a new workplace programme.
If you are still deciding which subjects to cover, start with our guide to planning sustainability content marketing. Here, the focus is on organising the people, information, and decisions so communication can happen.
Agree on who is responsible for ESG communications.
Sending a draft to a long list of reviewers does not give anyone clear responsibility. One person checks the numbers, another rewrites the introduction, and a third assumes somebody else has confirmed the claim.
Before drafting, agree what each person needs to contribute.
A practical division of responsibilities is:
- Sustainability and technical specialists: Explain the evidence, measurement methods and limitations.
- Operational or programme leads: Confirm what happened, how it was delivered and its current status.
- Marketing and communications: Define the audience, develop the message and choose the format and channel.
- Legal or compliance colleagues: Review claims or disclosures that need their expertise.
- Leadership: Confirm strategic commitments and approve statements made on behalf of the organisation.
Assign one person to collect feedback, resolve conflicting comments, and confirm the agreed checks are complete. In a small business, one person may hold several responsibilities.
My background includes CSR and community programmes at Vodafone Australia and Optus, as well as leading communications for a global Anti-Money Laundering project at Standard Chartered Bank. Across those different settings, understanding who held the information and who needed to act on it was central to the communications work.
Establish what is ready to communicate.
A new policy, an active pilot and a measured result are three different things. The language should make their status obvious.
For each proposed message, ask:
- What has happened so far?
- What evidence supports the statement?
- Which sites, products, people or reporting periods does it cover?
- What remains uncertain or incomplete?
- Who can confirm that the information is current?
A business can explain a pilot before it has final results. It can describe what it’s testing, why, and how the team will assess it. Claims about the success must wait for evidence.
The same distinction applies to social programmes. Introducing a mentoring scheme establishes the programme’s existence. Participation figures show its reach. Claims about career progression need evidence of those outcomes and care when attributing them to the programme.
Keep a shared record of the proposed wording, its source, necessary qualifications, the person responsible and its approval status. Add a review date or a trigger, such as the end of a trial or publication of new results.
UNEP’s guidelines for providing product sustainability information emphasise reliable, relevant, clear, transparent and accessible information. For teams writing about products, those principles provide a useful check before a message reaches the design stage.
Putting it into practice: a packaging trial.
Say your business trials lighter packaging for one product range. What can you tell customers?
Operations confirms which products were involved and when the trial took place. The technical team checks how much packaging material was saved and whether more products were damaged in transit. Marketing uses those findings to explain the change.
If the evidence shows a reduction in packaging weight, you can say so, with the figures and scope to support it. Lower overall emissions would need a separate assessment.
Check the headline and images alongside the copy. “Lighter packaging for our skincare range” describes the change. “A lower-impact delivery service” makes a much broader claim that the trial has not established.
Plan sustainability campaigns around a clear purpose.
A campaign needs a reason for someone to pay attention or take action.
Perhaps customers need to understand a repair service. Employees need instructions for joining a mentoring programme. Suppliers need to prepare for new requirements.
Write that purpose into the brief. Then agree:
- The main message and the evidence behind it.
- What each audience needs to know or do.
- Which materials must be ready before launch.
- Who will answer questions once the campaign is live.
- How the team will assess the response.
A repair campaign, for example, needs more than an announcement. Customers will want to know which products qualify, what repairs cost and how to arrange them. Customer service colleagues need the same information before enquiries arrive.
Creative work can make the message easier to notice and understand. Give writers and designers the facts and qualifications up front so they can use them.
Assess campaign results against the purpose. Repair bookings may tell you whether people responded. They do not, by themselves, establish the service’s environmental benefit.
Connect ESG reporting with audience-specific communication.
Sustainability reports are often public documents. They may serve investors, customers, employees, regulators and other interested readers.
Their breadth and technical detail can make it hard to find a specific answer. Someone asking about supplier assessments may not need the full report, but they do need an accurate explanation of the relevant process.
Use the report as a source and make the connection traceable. Record the pages, figures and qualifications behind each piece of content.
Approval of the report does not automatically cover every new headline or interpretation. Shortening a statement can change its meaning, especially if the edit removes its scope or limitations.
Emissions figures are one example. A percentage reduction needs its comparison period and scope. Readers may also need to know whether it describes total emissions or emissions relative to an activity, such as production. Those measures answer different questions.
Our guide to turning ESG data into clear content explains how to retain that context. For environmental topics more broadly, see how to communicate environmental progress.
Once you understand the information, you can decide how to use it. Our articles cover developing a story from a sustainability report and seven ways to repurpose annual and sustainability reports.
Give teams messaging guidance they can use.
“Be transparent” is a reasonable instruction. A writer still needs to know what that means for the page in front of them.
Practical guidance should explain the organisation’s key messages, terminology and tone, with examples of how to apply them. It should also identify claims that need qualification and statements that require further review.
Keep brand guidance and evidence records connected. The brand book explains how the organisation speaks; the supporting records establish what it can currently say.
How Kyyte developed messaging guidance for e-Stewards.
The Basel Action Network created e-Stewards, a global electronics recycling and reuse certification programme.
It already had an established identity and a seven-page internal brand guide. The guide covered its mission, values, tone-of-voice principles, and key messages, but much of the guidance was limited to individual words or short statements.
Kyyte developed that material into a 17-page brand book, including:
- Explanations of ten values, organised into core and supporting values.
- Five developed tone-of-voice styles with guidance and examples.
- Supporting explanations for seven existing key messages.
- Expanded guidance on brand perception and visual identity.
The writing needed to handle a particular tension: communicating the environmental and human consequences of irresponsible electronics recycling while maintaining constructive relationships with businesses and certified processors.
A value such as “integrity” needed an explanation tied to e-Stewards’ work. Broad instructions about sounding authoritative and friendly needed enough detail for someone to apply them.
The completed brand book gave the organisation and its partners a shared reference for their communications. It shows the value of developing a brand’s language, especially when the subject requires both technical care and accessible writing.
Keep ESG communications current after publication.
Assign an owner to the published content as well as the draft.
A page may need attention when a target changes, a programme ends, new results become available, or a certification’s scope changes. Those developments can affect several channels at once.
When reviewing an update, check where the original statement appears. That could include:
- Website and service pages.
- Sales presentations and proposals.
- Campaign landing pages and downloadable documents.
- Leadership messages.
- Employee and partner guidance.
A shared message record helps the team locate affected material. Record where each claim is used and who maintains it.
Pay attention to questions, too. Repeated confusion about a figure or programme may show that the explanation is missing something. Send those questions back to the responsible people and revise the content as needed.
If an earlier statement was materially wrong, correct it clearly. A quiet edit may leave readers relying on the original information.
Sustainability marketing and ESG communications FAQs.
What is the difference between sustainability marketing and ESG reporting?
Sustainability marketing considers environmental and social impacts, along with the governance practices that guide business decisions, when an organisation develops and promotes its offering. ESG reporting documents environmental, social and governance information, often using reporting standards. Marketing and communications teams can use those disclosures to answer audience questions while preserving the scope and qualifications behind each claim.
Who should lead ESG communications?
Assign a lead to coordinate the work, with named contributors responsible for the facts, messaging and approvals. Marketing or communications may manage drafting and publication, while sustainability and operational specialists confirm the evidence. Leadership, legal and compliance colleagues contribute where the subject requires them. Be explicit about each reviewer’s role so important checks are not left to assumption.
What should an ESG communications plan include?
Include the communication objective, intended audiences, key messages, supporting evidence, channels, responsibilities and approval process. Set publication dates based on when information will be ready, and record when it needs review. The plan should also identify who answers questions after launch and how changes to the underlying work will reach the communications team.
Can a business communicate sustainability progress before reaching its targets?
Yes. Explain the target, what has been completed, the evidence available and what remains to be done. Keep planned actions separate from achieved results. Where progress is behind schedule, explain the gap and any changes to the approach. An interim update should let readers understand the current position without suggesting that the outcome is assured.
How can an agency support sustainability marketing and ESG communications?
An agency can help develop messages, interview specialists, establish writing guidance and produce content for different audiences and channels. Your organisation needs to provide access to the people and evidence behind the work and confirm the factual claims. Agree who reviews each piece and who gives final approval. Copywriting support does not replace technical assessment or independent assurance.
Need help planning and writing your ESG communications?
Kyyte works with organisations to develop messaging, interview contributors and turn approved information into clear communications for websites, leadership, employees and other stakeholders.
For a defined writing project, explore our ESG and sustainability copywriting services.
For broader support with messaging, content planning and delivery, explore our sustainability and ESG communications and marketing services.
