The Audiences of Sustainability
Contents:
Sustainability isn’t just a marketing buzzword—it’s one of the defining conversations of our time. But the way it’s talked about isn’t static. It shifts across platforms, communities, and industries, morphing in meaning depending on who’s speaking and why.
Here at Pulsar, we’ve been tracking those shifts. This hub brings together our latest research, reporting, and live conversations about how sustainability is perceived, debated, and acted on across digital culture.
What We’re Investigating
Sustainability has become one of the most urgent - and most contested - concepts in global culture. But while its importance is clear, its meaning is anything but fixed. That’s why we’re investigating not just what people say about sustainability, but how those meanings shift across industries, platforms, and audience groups.
By analysing language, sentiment, and behaviour at scale, we can uncover how sustainability is being reframed: as a marketing promise, a lifestyle aesthetic, a political demand, or a moral obligation. These distinctions matter. Because if we want to engage audiences, inspire change, or build trust, we need to understand what sustainability means to audiences.
Our flagship report
The Audiences of Sustainability
What does sustainability really mean to different audiences online? What’s changed since our 2021 exploration? And where do brands sit in the crossfire between trust and skepticism?
This deep-dive analysis draws on 23M+ data points across platforms like X, Reddit, TikTok, and Google Search to unpack:
- Evolving trends, from climate anxiety to solution-seeking language
- Perceptions of sustainability across sectors like fashion, tech and marketing
- The communities driving the discourse and how their optimism, timelines and behaviours diverge
- The shifting role of greenwashing, misinformation and media coverage
Read more and access the full report ->
More from the blog
Green claims, called out: how audiences challenge greenwashing
Why are audiences so quick to cry foul, and which brands get caught in the storm? We dig into the rise of greenwashing discourse and the brands entangled in it.
Less is more? How sustainability is fueling the rise of conscious consumption
No-buy. Low-buy. De-influencing. In a world of excess, some audiences are opting out. We map the motivations and the communities rewriting the rules of consumption.
Rethinking convenience: how audiences embrace sustainable compromise
Convenience is king… but some audiences are starting to dethrone it. From electric vehicles to sustainable art supplies, we look at how and why people choose the harder path.
Audiences of Sustainability event
What does sustainability even mean today? And who is its audience? Our half-day virtual event explored the tensions, trends and cultural fault lines in today’s green conversations. From behaviours and values to branding and communication, the sessions unpacked one of the most urgent and complex concepts of our time.
Watch back recordings and clips and read the key takeaways from each session here on our Audience of Sustainability Hub.
Read more about the full event ->
The event comprised of three sessions where our expert guests covered areas that help brands uncover what sustainability means today.
Sustainability & Behavior
Zooming in on the behaviors most linked to sustainability, from veganism to train travel, thrifting, activism and more. How do citizens & consumers square the tension between indulgence & compromise, ethics & enjoyment?
Sustainability & Marketing
What is the relationship between marketing & sustainability? Do purpose and impact help brands grow? Is marketing perceived as part of the problem, and where can it support meaningful change?
Sustainability & Meaning
What does sustainability even mean today? This short, introductory session explores the different, and ever-changing, connotations that the topic holds for different audiences, how it has changed over time and what's next.
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