When Ad Net Zero Aotearoa first came together, we began with a simple but ambitious question: what would it take to transform the advertising industry into a force for a low-carbon future?

We knew we couldn’t answer that question in silos. Real transformation requires collaboration — across creative, media, production, and advertisers. So, with the support of more than 55 organisations, we set out to develop a shared roadmap: a foundational vision that aligns our industry to 2030 and 2050 targets.

That roadmap gave us a common agenda, the first condition of a Collective Impact model that underpins successful systems change. It allowed us to see ourselves not as isolated actors, but as part of a wider movement to future-proof the advertising industry for a sustainable economy.

Building Shared Measurement

The second condition of Collective Impact is shared measurement, and here too we’ve made important strides.

• Carbon calculators are now available to measure operational emissions, production emissions, and event activations.
• The Global Media Sustainability Framework (GMSF) aligns the industry globally on how we measure the impact of media placement emissions.
• And in New Zealand, our first State of the Industry Report has set a baseline. For the first time, we can track progress year-on-year and hold ourselves accountable as a sector.
  

Together, these tools give us the ability not only to measure what matters, but to measure it consistently and credibly.

Equipping Advertisers with Practical Action

Measurement alone doesn’t drive change. We also need clear guidance on what to do differently today. That’s why we published An Advertiser’s Guide to Carbon Efficiency, outlining ten practical, low-barrier initiatives advertisers can take now.

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This guide has already become a reference point across the industry, distilling complexity into clear opportunities. It represents the mutually reinforcing activities at the heart of Collective Impact: each stakeholder choosing different actions, but all moving in the same direction.

The Next Chapter: Piloting for Proof Points

Now, we begin the next wave of our journey.

Our focus is on piloting initiatives from the Advertiser Guide with our Supporters, capturing real-world case studies that show what’s possible. These pilots will become our early adoption proof points — the stories and evidence that reduce uncertainty for others, inspire confidence, and accelerate wider uptake across the industry.

This is the moment where our collective effort starts to become visible. Pilots are how we turn commitments into concrete change. They’re also how we build legitimacy: when peers see results from organisations they respect, sustainable practices shift from being “innovative” to being expected.

An Invitation

As we enter this next phase, we invite all industry players — Supporters and non-Supporters alike — to participate:

• Supporters: work with us to pilot initiatives and share your results openly.
• Non-Supporters: watch for upcoming case studies and consider how you can bring these practices into your own campaigns.

By sharing our successes, challenges, and lessons learned, we can build the peer-to-peer momentum that transforms voluntary pilots into industry norms.

We’d like to invite you to pilot initiatives with support from Ad Net Zero, and share your findings with the industry through our channels. Please get in touch at jennifer@commscouncil.nz

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