Underwriters Laboratory’s UL Environment, which is certifying green products and verifying green product claims, has just announced the first product to be rated: Serious Materials’ EcoRock drywall. The product appears genuine, based on the excellent information on the company website, and it’s also got Cradle to Cradle certification.

While the UL assessment has UL’s brand clout behind it, they could add assurance and help alleviate consumer confusion over what’s truly friendly for the environment by providing complete disclosure about what their certifications mean on their website. Right now, there’s nothing on the UL Environment website that makes the label credible (except for the aforementioned brand power). By comparison, the Cradle to Cradle site has full disclosure.

Some questions they can answer: How and what are they testing? What is the process? What are the benchmarks and standards? Are they only looking at claims made or are they also comparing the product to similar ones? Do they consider what’s possible, so that if a company is only doing the bare minimum, it counts less?

Eco-labels are proliferating at a pretty fast clip. If they’re going to clear up confusion and help consumers sort out conflicting environmental claims and know what makes one thing greener than another, certifiers (and product marketers) need to help educate.

For more on the UL rollout, see Sustainable Industries’ excellent article. It was also covered at GreenBiz.com.

People trying to turn an innovative sustainability technology into a market-leading product or service often develop a religious fervor: theirs is the one true path to salvation. And that spirit can be great for maintaining organizational morale and motivating everyone to forge ahead through tough times. But it’s bad marketing.

Our sustainability challenges are enormous and fast-moving, and the reality is, there’s probably not a single solution to any one of them. When you say you have a silver bullet—the one thing that’s going to solve all our problems—you’re more likely to raise suspicions than inspire converts. Why? “I have the one best way” is an impossible claim to prove (at least until you’ve realized your dream), and it invites skeptics to pick your solution apart. Besides, we’ve all heard these boasts from others whose solutions didn’t pan out (or haven’t yet).

Maintaining credibility with outside audiences may require disciplining your enthusiasm a bit. “Over deliver and under promise” is still good advice, and it keeps the luster on your reputation.

When you’ve got a new product or service you believe will change the world—or at least your industry—naturally, you’re excited. And it’s tempting to slip into exaggeration about what you can or will do—but don’t.

Presenting goals as facts, stating best-case scenarios without qualification, hyperbole (“best,” “cleanest,” “most advanced”), and other forms of exaggeration are credibility killers.

Why? They trigger BS detectors, subjecting you to extra scrutiny. When people realize the statement is not quite true, they’ll doubt everything else you say. And they set you up for failure if you can’t deliver the best case.

Stay credible and create confidence in your enterprise by making the strongest claims that you can support. Don’t say you’ll have product on the market next year unless you absolutely know you will—give a conservative target date, and explain (briefly) what needs to happen for you to meet it. And don’t say your technology delivers the “world’s lowest emissions” or some such unless you’re prepared to back it up with an honest comparison of your performance with everyone else’s.

In short: if you can prove it, say it; if not, don’t.