BONUS CONTENT - B Locals Aotearoa Webinar series: Impact Storytelling—How to engage and inspire through well-crafted content

Everyone, and welcome to this Beat Locals it webinar. This is part of a series, so those of you who don't know what B Locals are, I should probably just give you a little explanation. So B Locals are I guess on the spot now because Andy's going to tell me whether I'm right or not. And also I see we've got Lucinda who's now actually kind of in charge of the B Local community. So B Locals are basically run by B Corps for the B Corp and B Curious community. So we run community run events in person and online just to help people connect to the B Corp movement, understand what it is and work out if it's something that they want to come and hang out with and play with. And so yeah, we've recently collaborated with the B Local Auckland and B Local Wellington team to create these online webinars where we're trying to bring content and ideas and people from around the country and spread the love and the, the excitement and interest in B Corp around New Zealand and Australia seemingly. Look at that. We've got, we've got international and I. So we'll just say hi really quickly. We've got Cath Rowe from Eagle Protect and Kathy Gillespie from Like Minded Learning. They are my two other B Local OC as we are called B Local Ototahi Christchurch Conspirers. So yeah, so thanks to them, to both of them for helping make this today. So we will get straight into it because you don't want to hear me waffle on. We have got two amazing speakers today. We have got Angie from B Lab and we're going to be kicking off with Angie and then we've actually got you a bonus. We've got two for the price of one. With our second speaker we were due, we, well, we thought we were grateful enough just to have Leon from Augusto but it turns out we got Leon and Michelle, both the co founders of Augusto. So we're going to kick off with Angie and then we'll, we'll hear some content from, from Leon. So I won't steal any thunder of Leon's and Michelle's before we get there. So Angie's going to kick us off with about a 20 minute overview of, yeah, her thoughts on impact storytelling, how to engage and inspire through well crafted content. So if you don't know Angie, Angie is from the B Lab Australia Artillery New Zealand team. She is the Director of Communications and Engagement so hopefully she knows a little bit about storytelling. I think we all know that Angie does. She joined B Lab in late 2022 with the role of building the profile of B Corp movement in the region and is now responsible for strengthening the B Corp community engagement. With 20 years, more than 20 years of communications and marketing experience across Australia and the uk. She has led strategic brand development, storytelling, engagement and campaigns for a wide variety of organizations from from large enterprises and household brands to nonprofits, startups and social enterprises. So without further ado, over to you Ms. Angie. What have we got?

Thanks Tim and huge thanks to you and Kathy and Kath for being such champions of the movement and volunteering your time to bring us together as part of the B Local Network. It's really awesome. So yeah, I'm Angie, I'm joining you from NAAM Melbourne, Australia and Wurundjeri country. My pronouns are she, her and I'm really happy to be here. I have some slides to share so I'm going to start sharing my screen. Hopefully you can all see that. So I I had the Fortune fortune of actually visiting Aotearoa to just a couple of weeks ago to join in the Sustainable Business Network Communicating Sustainability Masterclass, which is quite a mouthful, but I did really enjoy coming out there and continuing to learn and I think that it's great that you're all here to have this conversation and keep learning together. There was some really great insights and thanks for the introduction Tim, but I even though I have been working in communications and marketing for over 20 years, I'm still learning every day and it's very much the case in the in the B Lab community. In B Corp network. There's so much inspiration to share. So I am going to talk to you a little about B Lab and B Corp. Just I know many of you know about our movement but I'll just touch on that and then how you can use that as a framework for impact storytelling and provide a few examples. So I'll kick off and most of you will know that B Lab's global vision is to mobilize the community of businesses to use their force for good. And we're working towards towards a vision for an inclusive, equitable and regenerative economy. And that really drives a lot of the communication that we do as an organization and it also gives us a lot of connection to amazing storytelling. And B stands for benefit for all. And one of the things when I think about communication and impact storytelling is really thinking about who do you benefit and what is the benefit you bring. So B Corps are obviously committed to benefiting people, planet and communities and really understanding who and what and how you are bringing impact and bringing benefit to the community is an important part to inform your storytelling. B Corp certification has three main requirements you'll be familiar with that are essentially meeting the high standards of environmental and social performance, accountability and transparency. And these fundamentals I think are really important to inform storytelling too. In particular the accountability that we have to purpose and stakeholder governance. So that purpose sort of underpins everything you say and do. And starting with that is absolutely critical. And really knowing who your stakeholders are informs how you can then take an effective story to them. Transparency is super important, particularly in this context at the moment. And I think that that is a principle that we should consider at all times when thinking about our impact storytelling too. We've now got more than 600 B Corps across Australia and Aotearoa, New Zealand. Shout out to the New Zealand Kiwi Bees as well, because now over 120in in New Zealand. And I really would encourage everybody. I see CRB corps as leaders in storytelling. So leaders in impact and positive change. They're quite inspirational. I'm learning from them every day and encourage everybody to take some time to actually investigate and understand and connect with the B Corp community. And look at the ways that our B Corp community is doing storytelling. We've got businesses of all shapes and sizes, different purposes, different stakeholders, but essentially a shared vision. And working in that positive, purpose led business space creates some incredible content to really engage and inspire audiences. So do make sure you reach out to the community as you are today and connect with one another and see how you can collaborate for both collective impact, but also to inform your own storytelling.

So I mentioned purpose before and I think that's really critical to start there. And we can't underestimate the power of purpose to drive our businesses. So the clarity of knowing why we exist, starting with why, to use Simon Sinek's famous term, really getting to the heart of what you're doing and why you're doing it, that is critical to informing your storytelling. And underpinning that as well is your brand. So we can't underestimate the power of the brand, which is essentially out of your hands. It's how people perceive your organization and your impact. And it's the culmination of many of their experiences and touch points. So storytelling is one part of that. But thinking about your brand, what you represent, the values, the attributes, the style and the, the character, the humor. I know that Tim's brand, for example, is very much led with a sense of. A sense of humor and quirkiness and so having those kind of principles and core values and staying true to those informs a consistent approach to your storytelling, which people do need to have when they're trying to understand who you are and what and what you represent.

The B impact assessment is a tool many of you will be familiar with, but it is a great platform to inform your storytelling pillars. So when we go through the B impact assessment, it's a freely available tool for any business. Essentially, you're able to measure and manage your impact and identify where you're doing well and potentially where you can improve. And understanding kind of those kind of core areas where you are doing super well can be great fertile ground for finding engaging and captivating stories. So we look at two kind of main things, which is the operational impact of business and also the impact business models, which are a bit harder to achieve. But if you are able to demonstrate an impact business model, I would start there and find the stories at the heart of that, like who are the people behind that impact business model that you're benefiting and how can you elevate their stories? For example, you may have a supply chain model or you may be working in a design to give model where you give back part of your profit or services back to a community in need. So thinking about who benefits and finding those people and identifying their stories and using that to inform your storytelling is super powerful. But also in the context of transparency, looking at the areas where you can improve and being open and honest about those when you are communicating with your audience will build connection too. So knowing your audience, I've popped in a picture here from Karma Drinks because when I was at that SBN session a couple of weeks ago, Simon Coley from All Good and Karma Drinks talked about the importance of research. And one of the things we always need to remember is that we are not our audiences. So we get very heavily ingrained in our own businesses. And it's very easy to get caught up in what you think people know or what you think you know about your customer or your audience that you're talking to. But it's really important to do research. So what Allgood found out, I mean, they have bananas that are for good. And when they were designing their business model, they did some research to understand.

Even though we know from research that 60% of people are more likely or prepared to pay more for high impact businesses and good businesses, what does that actually mean in the market? So storytelling is a form of selling and we do need profit to sustain our businesses. And he learned that customers were willing to pay $1 extra per kilo for bananas that did good. And so they've used that insight to inform how they've commercially modeled the business, but also to help them understand like, that the power of the that storytelling does matter to their customers. And so I thought that was an interesting takeaway to share with you and how it reflects just the importance of understanding your audience before you communicate with them and acknowledging that different audiences have different needs and different stories will resonate with them. So you need a toolkit. Oops, I've gone the wrong way.

Now. The best stories we know have tension and triumph. The Hero's Journey is a very well kind of understood arc and framework for storytelling. And good stories that humans hook into tend to have a character who faces a challenge and overcomes it. And the same can be said for businesses. And I'm looking forward to hearing from Augusto later on because I'm sure they'll talk a bit about the design of a good story. And I think that the storytelling principles that come from unpacking the challenges that we face and the tension that we face as businesses and how we're moving towards our purpose and our vision can be a similar framework. You might also be thinking about your origin story as well. So what was the insight that drove your business to be born and the heart of what you're trying to achieve? How can you tell that story.

Using an interesting story arc that engages your audiences?

Trust and transparency is super important. So we're all striving for authentic brands and we are operating in a context of mistrust and misinformation. And one particular watch out, which we're hearing a lot more about recently is greenwashing. And there are a number of other forms of washing. So essentially overstating claims or misleading audiences about the impact you have is something to be really careful of, not only for the reputational risk, but also as a regulatory risk as well. So we're seeing organizations like the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission and Consumer NZ cracking down on greenwashing. But as purpose led businesses, we really have a responsibility to do the work and substantiate our claims of our impact before we lead with our storytelling. Because the reality is those organisations won't be able to stop everything. And I think it's more than 70% of people don't have time or capacity to actually check the claims that are being made by businesses. And also it's really hard to find out, like if a business says something, are they actually doing that? So it's really important that before you do lead in into your storytelling, that you do substantiate the claims and you have the data and evidence to back it up. And with storytelling, there's a kind of debate around emotion and rational approaches. And we know from a lot of research as well that taking an emotional approach, not only does it open up more cognitive capacity for us to process information as listeners, but it also is more effective in terms of driving perceptions and behaviour changes. So it's important to have those emotional stories, but then back it up with the facts and keep telling your story and following through on that path for impact improvement.

And we are also operating in a context of global crises, so it's pretty overwhelming when you think about the impact that humans are having on this planet.

And particularly with climate change and pandemics and health and poverty crises. And so this can be despairing. And so playing into some of that can get a hook can help. But it's really important to create hope. You can engage your audiences in meaningful and simple ways by providing them with simple and tangible actions that they can, they can take an example I've shared here is the Eco Store recent campaign on no laundry day. So they came up with this day. They decided to do it. They got really great engagement and this is reflecting their commitment to water reduction in the environment. And so coming up with some of the ways that you can engage your audience in simple, meaningful ways to take action can be something to consider to improve the understanding of the impact that your business is having too.

Keep it simple. I know there's a phrase keep it simple stupid, but I like to say keep it simple. Sweet.

So the sustainability and impact is incredibly complex. There's lots of terms, there's lots of lingo, but what it's, it's. You don't need to tell everything all at once. So I think it's really important to pull out going back to that purpose and what you stand for and then using those storytelling pillars and building out a range of stories based on simple insights that show your understanding of your audience and you're able to communicate your impact in simple and meaningful ways. And making it memorable is really important too.

It would be remiss of me not to say that B Corp certification does help you to communicate sustainability. So that small, that small mark on your packaging or on your website can communicate a lot. And.

We do rely on our B Corps to tell the story of what B Corp means to them. And also that then impacts the rest of the movement too. So awareness is building globally around what B Corp represents and the research from around the globe, which we are going to do soon in our local region, shows that people who understand what B Corp is are much more likely to buy from a B Corp or engage with a B Corp in some way.

So this is a really powerful trust mark to communicate and it allows you to tell a lot about your environmental and social commitment in a very short space of time. And we know that people do have very limited time and you have a very short space of time to engage.

I would encourage everyone to test and learn. So taking Julia from Kiwi Bank's words, do the mahi, do the work. Essentially doing the work first to inform your storytelling and using the B Corp framework is one way you can do that. And then testing and seeing what sticks. Knowing again that smaller businesses in our community don't necessarily have comprehensive budgets and teams and resources, but you can test in small and meaningful ways to see what really resonates with your audiences. And it may be as simple as testing stories with a smaller group before you send it out more broadly to your network.

And also seek out support from others in the network too, so you can learn from others. So I have three quick examples before I wrap up. So the first one is an Australian brand. Who Gives a Crap is a toilet paper production company many of you may be familiar with. And what I really like about this brand is that they have a really serious mission. They're committing 50% of their profits back to providing toilets to communities around the globe that don't have access to clean toilets and sanitation. But they, they do it in a way that is not. They don't take themselves too seriously. So this is about understanding your brand and what you represent and using that to inform your storytelling and understanding your audience. So they recognize that that fun and playful nature is what's resonating and connecting with their, with their customers. And who Gives a Crap was actually started from a storytelling moment. So Simon Griffiths, the founder, actually sat on a toilet for 50 hours to, to crowdsource $50,000 to fund his business. And that in itself was a storytelling moment that got lots of coverage and engagement and set them on a pathway for that kind of continued.

Narrative of a fun business. And they, they have also done some really cool fun things recently. Like they convinced the solar power panel company to, to spell out we give a crack on the roof of their Australian warehouse and use that as a storytelling moment too. Or they've connected with their customers to find out what their eco fails are and shared them back on their Blog So things like forgetting to take your reusable shopping bags to the supermarket face palm kind of vibe. So and they're really playing into that kind of positivity as well. So yeah, what they're doing is really serious but how they communicate it is with a bit of fun.

Patagonia is one of our hero brands in the B Corp movement. Many of you will be very familiar with it. They actually have 50 more than 50 years experience now storytelling and have always been an environmental activist brand. And the don't buy this jacket campaign from 2011 is really sort of stood out in many of our minds as an innovative and kind of compelling approach to communicating impact. And Yvon Chouinad who established the business in 1973 has said throughout time that whenever he does good for the business he actually makes more money. And now the business has.

Has made Earth their only shareholder. Which was another moment which we, we can aspire to but it's not necess possible for us all to be Patagonians of the world. But what they've done now is they've sort of moved into essentially being a media channel as well. So their roaring journals actually features beautiful films and stories and podcasts to connect with that emotional side and their commitment to protecting the environment. But they also do a really good job of balancing their communication with a great product. So you need to make sure that you're not only doing the positive work on the impact, but you have a service or a product that meets customer needs.

And, and a Kiwi B Corp AWA Maori owned business who's really committed to fighting period poverty in Aotearoa. I think they're a great example of a brand that's really true to their purpose and they, they do the work by giving back to the community but they are also have a really strong brand and educate their audiences. Anyone with a uterus trying to empower power them to understand and communicate and learn more about the experience of menstruation and other issues that affect their, their audiences. And they're really transparent, accessible and authentic in their brand and they show things like the traceable supply chain in their product pages to really educate their audiences to understand what they're doing but also to improve and encourage action amongst the their audiences too.

They're my three examples. That's my 20 minutes. Thank you so much for your attention and really keen to connect with any of you. So feel free to hit me up and I will share a couple of resources as well in the chat. Go on.

Boom.

Perfect timing. Look at that you are a professional. Any. Yeah. Round of applause for Angie either in real life or if you can work the emoji thing like Jaz has done, go crazy. Any questions specifically for. Yeah. Anything that Angie was talking about before we we roll into to Leon and Michelle.

I've got a, I've got a question. Just being a marketing company ourselves, what do you think the importance is that the marketing and this is not to get business. What do you think the importance is that the people working with you are values based as well from a marketing perspective and this is a genuine question to put out into the, into the group.

To the group or you to you and you first.

Yeah, sure. Do you mean around the, the clients that you're working with as an agency as well or just more opposite.

I mean. Oh yeah. Like so if you're, if you've, if you're purpose led and impact led, how important is it that the agency or understands this work and is values and purpose based led rather than just maybe doing the odd campaign for pr? I'm, I'm really interested in your thoughts and experience around that.

Yeah, absolutely. Well one of the things, I mean I guess starting. We always start with ourselves and in, in terms of B Corps and the businesses, the purpose led businesses, our primary, what we encouraged people to think about is that the primary audience is actually the employees that you're working with. So really engaging your staff and aligning on your purpose and values and mission first.

But I guess when you are collaborating on. One of the benefits of working in the B Corp community is that you are on a level, level playing field. So we do find that B Corps working with B Corps is really powerful and also super efficient too because there is that base level of trust and understanding of the commitment that you make to people, planet and communities. But yeah, absolutely. I think it's critical that you have those convers up front and make sure that you are aligned when you're working together.

It's really interesting.

I just, I just add to that I think the.

The bigger your supply chain is, you know, the further back in your supply chain that, that they're still good going on. That that just becomes you know like our is a classic example. It's like we've gone back and we know that not just us pulling the product together and putting it in a box and marketing it are doing good, but everyone around us is doing good and there's an increasing depth that people are looking for, including B Lab itself in the potential new standards coming in the future where People want to know more than just it looks nice in the box. We know that you're a good company. We want to know more about how you, how you operate. So Belen, am I saying your name correctly?

Yes.

Perfect. Hello.

Thank you, Angie. Thanks team. It's amazing so far. It's great. I love it. Question about the tools that you have in the website, because I saw that you mentioned the impact assessment, but what happened also with the CDGS Action Manager and the climate tool, Is that something that worth it to use and also display that information and build trust with those tools? Because sometimes the impact assessment could be like huge for a small company. So is that a good.

Yeah.

Has a really good reliability. Those other tools.

Yeah, yeah. And I mean open the floor to others who want to contribute to this. But yes, the SCG Action Manager is a really great intern internal tool to use to help you benchmark where you are doing well, aligning to the Sustainable Development Goals and you can use that. I'm going through the B Impact Assessment and the SDG Action Manager.

We hear a lot from people that it kind of. Sometimes you're already doing the work, sometimes you identify things you need to improve to meet the requirements and through that process of building the evidence, you're actually building the evidence for your business and that's what you can hold.

True.

But they provide a really useful place framework for you to kind of then inform what you communicate about. Thank you.

Cool. All right, we're pretty much on time, so with that in mind, we'll roll on through. So we, like I said, we're very fortunate. We've got two for the price of one. Or as they used to call it in marketing. In the marketing world in the UK it was known as bog off. Buy one, get one free.

Which links back to who gives a crap, I suppose. Bog roll, bog off. Who knows? We're going down all sorts of rabbit holes. So with us we have Leon and Michelle. So I only have the bio for Leon though. So Michelle, you have to fill in some blanks or Leon can co introduce you. But Leon is co founder of Augusto with Michelle. Augusto is a hybrid creative and production agency that brings the thinking and the making together to offer clients everything from concept to creation. Leon has a history based in the practical side of radio, film, TV and interactive marketing. And Leon and Michelle started Augusta in 2008 just as the content revolution started. Well, that seemed like pretty good timing.

Leon remains on the practical side of content creation as a camera operator and director. He is also co creator, producer and Co host of New Zealand's longest running podcast called the Cryptid Factor. Along with co host Reece Darby. Kiwis will hopefully know who Reese Darby's is. Aussies maybe, I don't know. And Dan Schreiber. The three take a comedic look at the strangest side of life. Now, having had a good chat to Leon a few months ago, I particularly understand if you have a ponchon for UFOs, his podcast could be the rabbit hole that you're looking for. I'll just leave that there. It's all up for you to go and go and find it. But yeah. Leon, do you want to introduce Michelle or does Michelle want to introduce herself or do you feel like you've introduced Augusto enough?

Better introduce myself.

I am the co founder of Augusto very proudly talk a little bit about our leadership journey and how we got to impact and why we're so focused in the impact space. But my background is as a TV director and filmmaker as well. Leon and I started the business out of a back bedroom in 2018 right in the beginning of the GFC to get some more time back.

Futile effort.

Yeah, we had.

This time. We now have four. We're like, I know, let's start a business.

And we now have 45 odd starts accidentally. So the time, getting the time back is. Was fut.

So I ended up finding myself running an ad agency of which I'd never worked in an ad agency. Luckily I don't know who's Batman and Robin? You're Batman.

You're Batman.

And now I run a tech company so I've moved into tech helping kids stay in sport which is completely impact led. So we've had a pretty crazy 15 years and such a pleasure to be able to help, you know, share our story and hopefully we can give you some interesting insights into our process of choosing to go do B corp. The process which largely Leon has been leading and also bringing the staff along on that journey. We're not fully there yet. We're how far away Tim?

We were hoping so for. For a transparency. Yeah Leon. Well the Augusto team are like this close from being a bit. We were hoping that they would be.

A B corp any moment today.

They're like seconds away from being a B corp. But hey, the universe didn't inspire.

The cool thing is as we're still at the beginning of our journey. That's why I asked that question around how important is it that marketers are also aligned because there's some great opportunity I think with us working with more customers that Are B Corp and B Corp focused. But I've talked a lot. Why don't you go back our background a little bit?

Yeah, well, I guess the main thing for Michelle and I is that we did start at the content revolution. I guess we saw this really interesting moment in time and now looking back, it's obviously very easy to see the path of content and the content revolution as it was inevitable all along. But at the time that we started Augusto, the iPhone had just been released and you turned that little stone on its side and it looked very much like a TV screen. And the other thing that had happened is that YouTube was only a year old and had celebrated its one millionth tenth video uploaded. It was a big moment. And Vimeo had started the same week that we started Augusto. And that was really important because up until then when we started the company, we were used to telling corporate stories by burning them onto DVDs which would get handed out at trade shows. And those stories had to be hyper specific because it was going to be about a certain company's product or service at a level of somebody needing to actually know more information specifically around that thing. When we as storytellers, when we saw this ability for it wasn't actually even going to be ability, we had a belief that brands were going to have to tell their story in a public forum. And it was the first time that it happened. We saw ad agencies that were making 30 second television commercials for a million dollars. We saw TV companies making a six part documentary series for a million dollars. And there were little corporate video companies that were called doing the work with brands making DVDs. And we saw at this point that brands were all of a sudden going to need to be storytellers and they're going to have to tell their story in a public forum.

Not as a commercial sense. And so that's what really gave us the start. And we were really passionate about that. And we inevitably we started our company wanting to tell documentaries because we were always passionate about telling important stories and the stuff and thought telling brand stories, you know, in a short form sense, well that can bankroll us until we're big enough to make big documentaries. As it happens, what we've found out over the 15 years that we've been going is that the big documentaries, although they're wonderful. Michelle here is part of her bio. She has directed New Zealand's top grossing documentary of all time, which is Richie McCaw's Chasing Great, which is now coming on 10 years old and still holds the mantle for top grossing documentary of, of all time. It wasn't the one that made the most amount of money just on the download. Just because it might took lots of money in the box office. Not all that came to us. But that was really important because as a female leader and, and our company always being a dominant and female leadership. Michelle's been the CEO for the whole time. I've been riding the coattails or the Batman tails as it were.

That.

We in that process of making these documentaries we suddenly realized that the brand stories and helping brands tell their stories is so much more fun because you're helping people articulate what they do, you're helping them articulate their culture. But also more importantly, a documentary takes two or three years to make. And there's the commercial stuff. So that's I guess how we always had an intention tension of I think.

We thought would be more like 50, 50. But now the agency has Augusto. There's actually four companies in the group. Augusto has about 40 staff that do campaigns. And this is important because the type of work we do has changed through this process of impact. But we have 40 staff that work on primarily global work for brands like Adidas. And that's, that's an interesting story in itself. Tourism, New Zealand, Pathfinder and more and more impact brands. So that is probably the majority of the staff and revenue work in that space. We have another company called Cornerstore which does fast turnaround video content for sometimes big brands that are doing more, always on content or smaller companies that are looking to tell their story. We have the documentary division and then we have the tech division which I run now, which is, which is really cool. But I think the thing around impact has been really interesting journey for us because we started out, like we said, wanting to tell stories that impact people for good and realize that documentaries are really hard to scale, they're hard to get funding for. People might watch them once and then they sort of get forgotten. You've got advertising that we have a bit more impact. We can have more impact if we work with a brand that is impact led. And interestingly one of the most exciting things I think that happened when we started leaning further and further into wanting to being articulating that we wanted to tell more stories that impact people on planet for good as we attracted more brands that were aligned. When we started the process, I'm sort of jumping ahead but when we started the process of looking into becoming B Corp, I was a little bit nervous about how many years ago is this? Maybe two. Two years ago? Two, three. I was a little bit nervous about articulating it. Like, I was like, what if we talk about, if we say that we on all, all parts of the business, that if we broadly tell stories, can we be brave enough to say that we want to tell stories that impact people on the planet for good? And will that mean that the, the businesses that are helping pay our bills and keeping our staff in, in stable jobs will think that we're not a good fit for them and can we influence what they do? And there's all these interesting dilemmas because in some respects, our staff welfare and knowing that they have stable jobs is a really important part of our impact. But if the brands that are paying us to do that are not aligned, there's, there's that real, there's that real challenge. And so in whatever 2021, when we had been doing this for a long time, we had a procurement call with Adidas and as I said, we, we started with them making one little small video and in 2010, and we now do a huge amount of their work for their global, global business units. And it's scary when you get the call up that says, hey, procurement are looking at the ad agency roster because you're like, oh, I know we're going to potentially get, get turfed out of the roster. So we have this call and I was like, you know what, I'm just gonna just tell them what we care about. And if that doesn't align, well, God, well, you know, do we really want to work for this brand? And so I remember it was like an 8 7pm call and we're sitting down in the boardroom and I was like, well, she said, what do you want to do? And I said, well, actually, we want to work with brands that help the people on planet, that do things for people on planet for good.

And that's really important to us. And we're going through the B Corp process. And she was like, ah, that's really interesting. And we talked a little bit more about it and then we hung up the call and we're like, well, hopefully that went okay. And I think within a week we were given without having to pitch Adidas sustainability work. And that was like an unbelievable kind of light bulb moment where we were like, oh, my gosh. Firstly, we have to check out.

What that work is and we don't want to work help them greenwash. But that led to us doing all this amazing sustainability work. And from there we got the job to do again. Prince Harry people started hearing that we were talking about this stuff. And Prince Harry came to us through another connect and we got to do his work on sustainable. His sustainable travel brand called Travelist. We got Path founder work and it just started to kind of snowball.

Probably, probably the biggest part of that as well is that the staff, you know, the staff health here, them knowing that we were on this journey and that they suddenly started to see those benefits and start working on great work was, was really, you know, the most important part of it. And back to the B Corp process for us and going through that process of learning about ourselves by trying to apply for B Corp status, we learned ourselves that the staff are the most important thing for us. And that was the biggest part. And that has helped us tell our story. And now that is the biggest part of us telling our own story is how important our staff are. We've always said that our staff are more important than our clients and that is becoming so more and more true. So that is our journey now where we are actually trying to articulate how important our staff are and that the clients need to fit our staff rather than the other way. Probably some really practical tips, Just really conscious that we want to give some practical tips before we, before we get to a couple of questions, hopefully, probably the things that we're echoing, what Angie was talking about, some practical examples of brands that have come to us and wanting to tell their story. The very first thing that we talk about when a brand needs to tell the story, particularly this day and age, is the authenticity part. Whether it's a written story, whether it's on a website, whether it is a video, and whether or not you need to articulate it in a way that is, you know, B2C or B2B, whatever. The authenticity part is so critical because people this day and age sniff out inauthenticity faster than anything. And so that is authenticity. Though probably the most important part of that is being brave. And it's easy to say, oh, we were authentic and we're telling our authentic story, but with that, you need to be warts and all, we believe anyway. And I think people appreciate that. I think people appreciate the vulnerability that you show in that process. I remember a while ago, Adidas, one of the very first big jobs they brought to us was telling the history of the All Blacks Jersey. They wanted to make a documentary about it and have it self funded. Now, it was never going to be. It was impossible for them to actually fund this documentary and have people not know that they were the funders of it. The very first thing we said to them, are you prepared to be brave? And they were like, oh, yes, yes. Yeah, we're very, you know, open to that. And we said, what does that mean for you? And they say, oh, you know, we'll show our processes. And we said, well, are you prepared to show you failing? Like, oh no, no, we can't show ourselves failing. We're like, well, do you fail in the process of making the All Blacks jersey? Like, oh, yes. We actually have to start with it at a point of failure and bring it backwards. And there's really sometimes really nail biting. Sometimes we only get the jersey made right at the last second for the manufacturing process and what have you. And so it was a really hard process, but we actually got them to be brave enough to allow us to show that whole process of that vulnerability. And then when it came out, the one thing that didn't happen was that they weren't, they weren't judged or they weren't slammed for. I won't say greenwashing because there's nothing about environmental impact or anything like that. But it was certainly.

The authenticity that they showed of it that being so nail bitingly close felt like an authentic story, felt like a documentary, felt like they were being vulnerable. And it's still out there now. They still, although it's very old, it was 2011. It was a process they really enjoyed. Yeah. So that that authenticity needs to come from a place that almost feel. Makes you feel uncomfortable, I would say. Would you agree?

Yeah, I think particularly, I mean particularly for the, for the women, the female leaders in the room.

I've got a whole nother interesting perspective on this, but leaning into what you bring as a female. I love our story because, gosh, that's even reading some of the copy. It's really brave. I think being. Filling the space as yourself, as a woman and as a female founder in those instances is incredibly powerful. Rather than thinking you need to add more to yourself to fit what leadership might look like in your mind, we find, you know, female leadership allows great things for the men that you lead as well in. I know I'm a little bit off, off piece, but I do think, I do think your, your own story as a female is really important and the, the attributes you bring as a, as a woman into your company are incredibly powerful. So in that instance where there's female leadership, I definitely lead into that. And then like you say, I think you made a really good point, Angie, with your talking about and Tim about the most important people you're telling your story to is your staff. So just a little anecdote on that. We were. When you got, when you become B Corp it doesn't mean that all your staff are going to be on board with that. You can start hiring for people that really care about those, those, those value based things. But not everybody's going to come along, you know, feel as passionately as you do about saving the environment or sustainability or better practices for staff. But over time we've seen more and more people shift to really care about this, especially young people coming in. When we were talking about okay, we're becoming B Corp and we're so excited and we're going to start working with brands that meaningfully are doing good for people and planet. We'd just come out of COVID and we got offered the work to do to work on ineos which is petrochemical brand that sponsored the All Blacks and it was so fascinating. They came in first and we went nope, we won't work on any of us. And they went away and then they came back and they had their budgets and they were like we'd really love you to work on this. And that was really hard. Your values don't mean a lot until they cost you something, you know. And we had to really sit there and say we could really do with this money. This is, we've had a tough couple of years and are we brave enough to say no and create a vacuum for another client that is going to fit? And you know, I say nature. Applause A vacuum. That vacuum is very powerful. And we said no and took a big breath in and we had maybe seven emails from staff saying thank you for putting your money where your mouth is. And it would have felt really disingenuous for us to talk about this out in the open about being B Corp and then be working on ineos. And interestingly that's when I think that's when the Adidas thing actually just came in not far after that. And, and our work. So that's scary. But, but I that that story to your staff and being authentic to your staff is really, really important and sometimes it's really hard. Even now we still work on some brands that are alcohol brands and we've got like it's, it's, it's not always perfect and, and hopefully there'll be a time when we only tell stories, create more vacuums.

Mindful that there's only three or four minutes left and we didn't even get to talk about UFOs. So I'm really sorry about that.

I feel like there needs to be a whole separate webinar on. Yeah, maybe the intersection between B Corp and UFO is. That's going to be niche, but hey, wow.

I won't be there for that one.

Any. Yeah, any other sort of couple of tips like the brave one, I think is. Is so true. But yeah, any. Any other. In terms of like, because you guys are just next level in terms of your ability to tell amazing stories at the level that you're working at. So. Yeah, any. Any other. I mean, the hero's journey. Be brave. Yeah. Any other like two. Two or three top tips that.

Yeah, good. Good point, Tim. Know your audience is the biggest one. Know before you start anything else, before you start deciding to be brave and authentic, know exactly who your audience is to a degree where you can actually write them up and draw them as a person. You know? Right, right. Who that audience member is. Call them a name, call them, you know, Carol, 25 years old, you know, blah, blah, blah. Maybe have three or four people that you describe like that in a way that you actually know exactly who your audience is. And, and I. And I think probably the most important thing with that is don't write who your customer is. Write who your audience is. They need to be entertained. Any form of story is entertainment. And, and whether you are being, you know, trying to tell them, talk about your product, whether, you know, you're trying to talk about your beliefs or your.

Your ethics, it's still tory storytelling. You need to take them along on a journey. And don't be afraid to use AI tools. Don't be afraid to use chat GPT. Don't be afraid to actually get whatever help you can get to be able to help start.

That process of entertaining an audience.

Yeah.

Because it's very easy. I think most of us do it and we're guilty of it ourselves and desperately wanting to show what you are and who you are. And actually your audience is generally wanting to figure out what's in it for them. And if you can try really hard to put your audience and customer right in the center of your thinking. It Sounds really like 101, but you'd be surprised. 95% of businesses don't do it.

What their customer is getting from them is not their first thought. It's actually like quite far down the list. So if you can just put them right in the center of what are they getting? Almost like you strip off your own needs and go.

What value am I bringing to this company meaningfully and authentically, then it's quite easy to sell.

I remember also there was a question there about how do you make sure that you're not greenwashing? And I think that is a really, that's a really interesting and challenging one to do because in that authenticity and I think this is where being brave can help. And you talking about your own, you know, being. The best way to know not greenwash is to show how you are trying to not greenwash, if that makes sense. And as in as much as showing your vulnerabilities in trying to be sustainable, in trying to be a values based business, none of us get it right, as Michelle was saying. And so.

In talking about wanting to not greenwash and talking about how you are trying to get to a point where you are the best you possibly can be. But showing your vulnerabilities I always find is a really, really good way to, to make sure that it's not seeming somebody coming out and saying, you know, that, you know, their product is the be all and end all and does everything to solve every problem in the world is, is never going to get there. The latest campaign we're doing just on the download but with.

With Adidas, with their sustainability campaign is part of it. They actually talk about how they know that they've been been part of the problem and that they are trying to do what they can to not be that problem going forward. So.

Yeah, that's I think a really important point.

Oh, and the last thing I'd say is just arm your staff with your story as well. They are. We often forget that they're one of your biggest channels to market. It's the barbecue talk. What do you do and why and let them buy into and believe the story so that they talk passionately about what you do. That's incredible. Incredibly powerful.

They should be your first audience potentially. Yeah.

Beautiful. Too easy. Hey, well, thank you so much guys. Round of applause for Leon and Michelle and for all the amazing work you guys and girls are doing.

We had when people booked in for the event, there was your option to submit some questions. We've got a couple of questions there.

And I'll actually, I'll go with this first one because I think this is a really, really great one. How do you convert story inspiration to sales in this very tough economy? That's like right to the heart of this. Like, yeah, marketing. You know, I'm, I'm a reformed sales guy so I love picking on marketing people because it's like you guys saw the coloring in and then allegedly I'm going to be swamped with all these customers. But you know, as Peter Drucker said, we know that marketing works, we just don't know which, you know, we know the 50 of marketing works, we just don't know which 50 it is. So yes, how do we create action?

I feel. Yeah, I mean that's a whole topic, isn't it?

That's our next webinar topic sorted.

Maybe that is one to talk to because I think if your story is really authentic and you really believe it, it comes through so naturally to the point where you almost need to put a lid on how enthusiastic you are about solving the problems with our tech company Coachmate, which helps, it's quite a long story, but that helps keep kids in sport through supporting parent volunteers who deliver sports to deliver great sports experiences. The people who pay for it are sports bodies and interestingly, we just won the Golf Australia account to deliver golf to kids across Australia. And when we were in there I asked them why did you choose us? And they said, actually I think they volunteered it. They said because we believe that you really cared about the problem. Now obviously we have a finite. We, we, we have to be a sustainable business. It's profit and purpose. But because we so genuinely care about the problem which is helping kids stay in sport for their mental health and for the well beings of their communities, it just came through. And so of course you've got to back that up with a great product and, and a good business model and, and great numbers that that work. You have to understand your customer. But gosh, that goes a long way. Like I think they probably we might have even been more expensive but they just believed that we were going to be their partner to help them solve that problem. So that's what I'd say. The authenticity really helps.

Nice. And I think as you sort of mentioned the entertain thing and Angie's I believe tongue in cheek comments about my style, but that's very much what we're about. Like there's a whole bunch of stuff that is pretty bad in the planet and for people but if you just go doom and gloom, oddly enough, people don't like to engage in that. People want to see inspiring, they want to see someone's actually giving this a go. Let's get. You know, for me my whole methodology behind marketing is looks like we're having the best party on the street that people want to come and have come want to have a beer with you. So yeah, I think, yeah, you. Like I said, I think that's something that you really Bring because you've got that understanding of that entertainment which I think quite often marketing forgets maybe the entertainment side of it rather than like you say, we just don't try and sell the product. So let's just get a brochure out there that sells the product rather than.

Think, think Robbie Williams, I guess is the key, isn't it? Let me.

Yeah, yeah.

Cool.

I've got another question. So green washing is one thing, but green hushing is the other thing, the other end of the other discussion. And I think you kind of talked to it quite a lot about being brave, but quite often something we hear, you know, more broadly in the Be Corp community is, oh, I didn't want to tell that story because, you know, I thought people wouldn't believe me or they criticized me for not having it done well enough. So I suppose the bravery, you kind of covered it on that. But yeah, Angie, maybe bringing you back in. Any thoughts on how we comp. How we conquer green hushing as much as green washing and, and finding that sweet spot, Goldilocks of storytelling?

Yeah, there's some, there's some pretty interesting impact at research from brand finance. You might have seen about the disparity between sustainable credentials and perception of sustainability and what some brands who are actually doing great work and not talking about it are losing value from not communicating it. So there's the business side of it, but more importantly from B Corps in our role, like it's about.

Showing the leadership and connecting with the customers is a way to drive change. So if we're not talking about what we're doing, we're not encouraging, inspiring others, others to do it too. And that's a risk as well. But I think, I mean we do, we did actually just. I just posted in the chat earlier, starting with the substantiation, which is where the B Corp, I mean, I'm telling the B Corp story, but where the B Corp framework comes in, you've got the evidence, so you give you the confidence to talk about what you're doing. And then when you do go to like making a claim, like an aspiring claim, you just need to make sure that when you're leading with that, like we want to do this, we want to reduce, we want to be net positive by blah, blah, date, you actually need to just make sure you've got a plan to get there to back it up. So do the work and go out there and be bold and be brave, as Augusto says, but make sure you've got the credibility and the credentials to back it. Up and yeah, try not to be shy. And I, I challenge you on the marketing people making things look pretty.

Marketing. Marketing people need to be involved from the beginning, like very beginning.

And they need to be involved in the sustainability strategy of the business as well, so that it's really embedded in the culture of the organization and that everyone's really committed to sharing that story. As Leon and Michelle said, your employees are your best ambassadors.

And just to add to that. That's a really good point, Angie. And just to add to, I guess specifically to the New Zealand audience, Australians. Michelle's Australian. She tries to hide it at times over here in New Zealand, around rugby matches in particular, but to the New Zealanders in the audience, I think there's a common thing with, you know, the, the Tall Poppy syndrome. And, and it's a real thing. It's a very real thing. And I think as New Zealanders, we, we, we don't celebrate success enough. We don't celebrate our desires to do better enough. You know, we, we downplay ourselves a lot and it's a real issue and, and I think it's something that needs, needs to, to be combated over time. But I, I think that green hushing comes into play there as well. That none of us, we didn't even want to put our logo on our door three years until we felt we were good enough as far as a brand ourselves. But, but with this, I think again, you know, authenticity and, and bravery is probably another part of the solution. But I'd encourage people to try and get over that Tall Poppy syndrome.

Be so proud. Like, the B corp thing is not easy and the fact that you, you put the effort in to do that and change your policies and stuff, it's something to be really proud of. That credential is not you saying you did good. You get to say, hey, other people looked at what we did and they said it was good enough. And maybe that, that'll give you a bit more confidence to be really proud and talk about it. It is tricky though, because you don't want to be like, we're b cop, are you not?

But even the process of being on the journey and being able to say, hey, it's long journey and we're not quite there yet. Yeah, I felt really proud to talk about that.

Oh, all right, well, we've got a minute left. What I would like to do, for those of you who are still on the perfect timing to thank you massive round of applause again to Leon, Michelle and Andrew. If your game, if you're up for it. If you're happy to go one minute into your lunch break, what I'd like to do is chuck a bunch of you into some breakout rooms with just you and one other person and just have a chat with that other person. And what is the big thing that you've learned from today? Or what's the big thing that you're gonna do? Or to finish off with a bit of Robbie, what are you gonna do to entertain some people and inspire them to go and do some more good? So thank you so much. I'll chuck in a breakout room. When you leave the breakout room, you'll just disappear, appear. So thank you so much. And we'll send you links and all that kind of stuff. So breakup rooms coming your way.

Hey, it's Tim here, that B Corp bloke from Grow Good. If you want more content on purpose, B Corp, how to do more good in the world as an individual or a business, then you know the drill. Hit the like and subscribe. Check out some of our other videos. They're probably floating around here somewhere. You know how it works. Thank you so much. See you next time.