Corporate citizenship as a marketing instrument ‐ Concepts, evidence and research directions

Abstract

Confronted with increasing pressures to limit government spending on social welfare, more and more public policy makers welcome the growing social involvement of corporations. Yet, inasmuch as corporate citizenship may be desirable for society as a whole, it is unlikely to be embraced by a large number of organizations unless it is associated with concrete business benefits. This paper presents past findings and proposes future research directions useful for understanding the potential value of corporate citizenship as a marketing tool. Specifically, after examining the nature of corporate citizenship, the paper discusses its potential impact, first on consumers, then on employees. Two conceptual frameworks are introduced to guide research on the value of corporate citizenship in terms of external and internal marketing respectively.

The Impact of Corporate Volunteering on CSR Image: A Consumer Perspective

“…It is argued that superior financial performance is delivered through CSR primarily due to reputation effects (see Orlitzky et al, 2003). Supporting this notion, consumer research argues that a strong CSR image enhances brand differentiation (McWilliams and Siegel, 2001), brand equity (Hoeffler and Keller, 2002), competitive advantage (Porter and Kramer, 2002), consumer attitudes, purchase intentions, and loyalty (Maignan, 2001). However, it should be noted that these relationships have never been investigated for CV activities.…”

“…Corporate volunteering is an increasingly salient CSR activity that demonstrates proactive, discretionary corporate citizenship (Maignan and Ferrell, 2001), and engages stakeholders both internal and external to the organisation. An increasing number of organisations have formalised CV programs, whereby the firm supports and organises opportunities for employees to volunteer their time and skills in service to the community (Basil, Runte, Basil and Usher, 2011;Cavallaro, 2006;Peloza, Hudson and Hassay, 2009).…”

How corporate social responsibility can effect on the consumers` attitude and behavior?: a conceptual study

“…Amid to most recent time purchasers progressively anticipate that organizations will make a more extensive commitment to society (Dolnicar and Pomering, 2007). Hence, professional social promotional activities, for example, CSR exercises can be a business sector separating system (McWilliams and Siegel, 2001) which may bring out a mixture of game changers (Lichtenstein et al, 2004;Maignan and Ferrell, 2001). They contended that the public is a play area wherever production exercises the working hence the societal hobbies are of concern to organizations and firms.…”

Social Gain: Is Corporate Social Responsibility Enough?

“…There are many benefits arising from corporate social responsibility (CSR) for companies, including increased profits, customer loyalty, trust, positive brand attitude, satisfaction, word of mouth and combating negative publicity (e.g., Barone, Miyazaki and Taylor;2000;Berger and Kanetkar, 1995;Brown and Dacin, 1997;Creyer and Ross, 1997;Drumwright, 1996;Luo and Bhattacharya, 2006;Maignan and Ferrell, 2001;Murray and Vogel, 1997;Sen and Bhattacharya, 2001;Sen, Bhattacharya and Korshun, 2006). For example, CSR contributes positively to market value, partially through customer satisfaction.…”