Social media has begun to play a key role in how companies shape their corporate social responsibility (CSR) policies and present themselves as good corporate citizens. The standard for CSR is being redefined and is evolving as a driver of innovation. The bottom line is now three-fold, and is centered around people, planet, and profit. As business leaders strive to build more sustainable and socially responsible entities, formal social media strategies are becoming paramount.
Today I attended a great session at Sustainable Brands conference by Suzanne Shelton, President and CEO of theShelton Group. Mainstream consumers are complicated. They know just enough buzz words to make you think they know more than they do, and most don’t actually go green to save the planet. How do mainstream consumers ACTUALLY make decisions about which green products to buy?
Claremont McKenna College’s Roberts Environmental Center recently released a detailed analysis of the social responsibility reporting efforts of the world’s top entertainment corporations that revealed that the entertainment sector lags behind most others in corporate environmental and sustainability reporting. The report scores companies based on the reporting, intent, and performance of their environmental and social sustainability efforts. The research, based entirely on material released on the firms’ Web sites, found that Bertelsmann, a German firm, and CBS, Viacom, and Walt Disney, outperformed the industry giants News Corp. and Time Warner. However, these firms scores were mediocre when compared to the scores of other industries.
