A Marketing Professional's Perspective

Randall Luttenberg

• Responses to this Article
• Literature Cited

Published: November 6, 2000

In addition to the "next steps" cited under "A Call to Action" in Whiteman (2000), the Scientific Community can (and, in terms of this article, should) make contact with scientifically literate professionals within the marketing discipline. Organizations such as ECO and Adbusters represent the most visible components of a potentially large pool of sympathetic, informed, and experienced collaborators.

Establishing relationships with organizations that already have functional marketing programs makes sense as a first step, but cannot possibly sustain the volume of communication necessary to inform the public about complex, multifaceted issues. It will be necessary, as the author mentioned, "for scientists, as individuals or as groups, to develop a variety of marketing strategies, to clearly identify key target audiences, and to learn how to execute effective marketing campaigns." Who better to learn how to accomplish these things from than those who have made it their specialty?

Speaking as a marketing professional, I believe that there are many of us who are both experienced in the use of a wide range of traditional and "guerilla" marketing techniques and committed to finding ways to use these communications skills to make a positive impact. Where, then, can you find us? This requires more follow-up than can be covered here, but a starting point might be trade organizations such as the American Marketing Association and the American Advertising Federation. I would welcome the opportunity to explore this further with interested members of the scientific and environmental communities, and can be contacted at rluttenberg@aol.com.

Responses to this article are invited. If accepted for publication, your response will be hyperlinked to the article. To submit a comment, follow this link. To read comments already accepted, follow this link.

Whiteman, G. 1999. Sustainability for the planet: a marketing perspective. Conservation Ecology 3(1): 13. [online] URL: http://www.consecol.org/Journal/vol3/iss1/art13