Pitching “Green” to Businesses at Susan Labandibar

Pitching “Green” to Businesses

The common wisdom these days is that green is good. No matter what your views, it’s hard to argue against efficiency or for pollution. In the grocery isle, organic produce usually carries a price premium that consumers are willing to pay for a product perceived as higher quality, or better for health and the earth.

Selling “green” to businesses is a harder proposition. The warm fuzzy feeling you get when you pick up a carton of soy milk can quickly dissolve when the staff accountant shows a graph of the yearly cost differential between your eco-friendly purchase and the cheaper conventional option. Most times, being green doesn’t hurt when pitching a service to a business, but you better have a convincing business case to back it up.

In the IT world, energy-saving options and virtual servers are par for the course. Tech Networks of Boston pioneered these technologies years ago, but they’re not particularly green – they’re just more efficient than the alternative. It’s not hard to sell 4 virtual servers – you just pitch a project with 75% lower hardware costs. These things make good business sense to the client, but in 2010, they are no longer the cutting edge of “green”.

So how does one convince potential business customers that supporting a socially responsible business is a winning value proposition? I wish I had a simple answer – it depends on the client’s culture, their values and their management. Someone struggling to green their own organization may have a sympathetic ear, but in any case, you’re going to need to convince the customer that a green option is the best option for their business.