Federico Roales from Getty Images: Brands and companies must make their environmental commitment visible and tangible through visual storytelling

The most recent report from VisualGPS, the research program of iStock by Getty Images, found that 83% of Latin Americans surveyed believe that products are designed to appear greener than they really are. Given these data, Federico Roales, Creative Insights Researcher at Getty Images, said that the importance of consumers who are willing to make the best commitment to environmental practices should be reaffirmed. “In the future, this will end up influencing their purchasing decisions and that is why it is important that brands and companies make their environmental commitment visible and tangible through their visual storytelling .” For Roales, sustainability is a central and horizontal axis to all industries and is also part of the conversation in Latin America today. “It seems fundamental to us to be able to change some perceptions regarding sustainability, how it appears visually represented, how notions of sustainability have historically been visually represented, as well as the actions that consumers and companies take with respect to involvement in the environment and Above all, how does that connect to consumer expectations and actions? We know that there is a very active and increasingly involved citizenry that asks companies for more commitment and this can be a great challenge. That is why we like that they see us as a visual content partner when it comes to being able to reflect their environmental commitments”. Regarding greenwashing, he said that there is a point where the commitments of the brands are not credible and that ends up contributing to the fact that it is more of a marketing strategy than a real commitment. He highlighted the importance of promoting values, authenticity and honesty of practices that are – according to Roales – one of the central issues that consumers highlight the most. “Behind these data, we can infer as an insight , that there is a demand from Latin American consumers towards brands to make their brand values and commitments regarding sustainability more transparent.” And for that, he said that there is no better tool than the visual language to be able to capture attention, especially in a multi-screen world. “When we look at our most popular downloads, less than 4% of the most popular images in Latin America represent sustainable actions. Actions such as recycling are not represented, nor is the efficient use of energy or consuming products of non-animal origin”, he highlighted. In addition, this representation appears in a very stereotyped way or that does not adapt to current reality. He gave as an example the typical image of hands holding a green planet. “That image was very important 10 years ago when it came to making consumers visible and alerting them to the imminence of the danger our relationship with the environment implied. However, at Getty Image and iStock, we have long designed visual content that can better connect with the values of contemporary consumers and lead them to action by reflecting individual practices that they are already taking. The expectation of consumers regarding the discourse of brands has also changed. “There is a dialogue where it is expected that the actions have a certain pedagogy and education in sustainable practices. (…) Provide environmental education so that consumers feel represented and motivated to contribute their grain of sand,” he said. His research also talks about diversity and inclusion, as well as, for example, the evolution of the financial industry, how the representation of people with its financial products has changed since the pandemic. “Today, the bank is our mobile phone, so how does that appear?” Even about what is the role of the new masculinity, etc. “As a team, as creative insights, we are behind the scenes all the time generating research on how visual representation is changing to be able to give the briefing internally to our content generators and we can meet those needs with powerful stories of visual impact through images and video.