James Gill shares practical steps to reduce the environmental impact of your marketing, without sacrificing performance. A grounded take on sustainability that actually works.
Whether you’re just starting out or looking to refine your sustainable approach, this episode will give you real, actionable ideas you can start using today.
This conversation is part of our Ethical & Sustainable Marketing Accelerator. Grab your free taster class at: amschool.click/accelerator
About James Gill
James Gill, CEO of GoSquared, is building EcoSend, a Mailchimp alternative for purpose-driven businesses, focusing on software design, marketing, and public speaking.
Find him on LinkedIn: click here
Every email sent, even those heading straight to the spam folder, creates a small carbon footprint. One email can account for up to 26 grams of CO2. When you multiply that by the estimated 720 billion emails sent daily, that’s quite a hefty impact.
James Gill
Practical Ways Marketers Can Lower Their Digital Footprint
When we talk about “carbon footprint,” it’s just one way to look at our environmental impact. Digital sustainability is really about minimising the environmental costs of all our online activities.
Think about it: every time you visit a website, scroll through social media, or send a marketing email, you’re using real-world resources.
Don’t worry, you don’t need to flip your entire strategy on its head overnight. As both Fab and James point out, small changes, driven by awareness and a bit of intention, can make a real difference.
Rethink Your Email Lists
Sure, blasting emails to everyone might seem harmless, but it’s quite wasteful, both for the planet and for your audience’s patience.
Get targeted: segment those lists to focus on people who’ll actually engage. You’ll cut down on digital traffic (using less energy) and see better results from your campaigns.
- Run quarterly list cleanups to remove inactive subscribers
- Implement double opt-in to ensure genuine interest
- Create audience segments based on engagement patterns
- Reduce email frequency to non-engaged users
- Consider using plain-text emails for certain communications
Optimise Your Website
Those huge images and autoplay videos might look impressive, but they’re energy-hungry, especially when thousands of people are loading them.
Why not compress images, only use videos where they truly add value, and consider hosting with green data centres? Your site will load faster too!
- Compress all images before uploading (aim for under 200KB per image)
- Enable browser caching to reduce repeated downloads
- Consider a “dark mode” option to reduce screen energy consumption
- Use lazy loading for below-the-fold content
- Choose a green hosting provider that uses renewable energy
Audit and Reflect Regularly
Start simple: what’s eating up the most energy in your marketing toolkit? The path to sustainability begins with awareness, not action. Just by thinking about the impact of your everyday choices, you’ll spot easy wins and can set goals that actually mean something.
Aligning Sustainability with Better Marketing
All in all, sustainable digital practices often lead to better marketing results. Leaner emails get more engagement. Efficient websites load faster, making life easier for users and boosting conversions. “Good marketing” and “green marketing” usually want the same things: what’s good for the planet often creates a smoother, more respectful experience for your audience too.