Sky calls for broadcasters to collaborate to help consumers decarbonise
Sky has called on broadcasters and content creators to “work together” to address climate change in their work.
The pay-TV broadcasters CEO Dana Strong also claimed this morning that Sky has, for the first time, gathered empirical evidence showing how creative industries can collaborate on changing consuming behaviour.
Speaking at the launch of today’s report, The power of TV: nudging viewers to decarbonise their lifestyles the COP26 Climate Change Conference, Strong said: “At Sky we have set out our pathway to achieve net zero carbon, but we know this alone will not be enough.
“Through the content that we bring into our customers’ homes we believe broadcasters have a clear role and responsibility to encourage lifestyle changes that address the climate crisis.
“We’re publishing these research results in full as an open tool for content creators and broadcasters. This means that for the first time we have empirical evidence demonstrating how the creative industries can work together to deliver the behaviour change required to meet our net zero ambitions.”
In the report, 10 new principles are outlined for broadcasters on how to encourage green behaviours from viewers.
One strategy that broadcasters and content creators can adopt is depicting “real people” making climate-friendly actions in all areas of TV content. This was found in the research to be the most impactful on viewer behaviour (41%), followed by activists (33%) and charities (32%).
Another principle highlighted was to aim content demonstrating positive environmental behaviours at children as this then had an important influence on the attitudes and behaviours of their parents.
Content creators should also include what specific lifestyle changes people can make and how to make them to be most effective at “social modelling” of behaviour, instead of “fear-mongering, blaming, and preaching to TV audiences”.
Key findings about consumer attitudes:
- 70% state that they are worried about the environment
- 70% state they are willing to make lifestyle changes in order to tackle the climate
crisis - 80% support the idea of broadcasters using content and advertising to encourage people to adopt more environmentally positive behaviours
- 75% support TV broadcasters ‘nudging’ viewers to think about the environment, either through documentaries, advertising or increasing the coverage of environmental issues in the news
- One in three surveyed have changed their lifestyle because of content seen on TV.
Sky’s Behavioural Insights team (BIT) carried out a survey across six European countries of 3500 participants about consumer attitudes to climate change and the impact of TV on behaviour.
Net Zero Carbon ad break
The report was published as Sky Media has created a series of spots for a Net Zero Carbon Ad Break that will run on Sky Nature and Sky News over the next two weeks.
Sky said this is a first for Britain and five brands in the ad break are winners of the Sky Zero Footprint Fund, a £1m initiative which provided each brand with £250,000 media value.
Here We Flo, Olio, Ovo Energy, Pura and Path Financial, created their ads following best practice from the Advertising Associations AdGreen programme.
Other broadcasters like the BBC and ITV have also committed to achieve “net zero” by 2030.