Objectives: This work investigates how different corporate social responsibility (CSR) assurance messages embedded in cause-related media marketing influence consumers’ behavioral intentions (social brand page joining and recommendation) affective attitudes (likability of the campaign). CSR authenticity self-serving motives are also examined. Methods: An experiment was conducted using F...

Q methods for increasing nominal wages reduce real wages (i.e., buying power) by creating inflation, shortages, lower quality, and long-term unemployment. To increase real wages (i.e., the ability to buy more), economic principles prescribe increasing productivity (i.e., greater output from less input). In contrast, marketing principles prescribes increasing the value of output (i.e., greater c...

Ted Levitt used to tell his Harvard Business School students, "People don't want a quarter-inch drill--they want a quarter-inch hole." But 35 years later, marketers are still thinking in terms of products and ever-finer demographic segments. The structure of a market, as seen from customers' point of view, is very simple. When people need to get a job done, they hire a product or service to do ...

The popularity of ethical consumption increases. This has motivated firms to increasingly implement Cause-related Marketing (CrM) campaigns in Germany. But research reveals that especially German consumers are sceptic with regard to the amount of money spent for the good ‘cause’ by the enterprises. This can be explained by the small share of information provided by CrM campaigns to consumers. I...

Research has consistently found that, despite a high degree of expressed concern about the environment, few individuals are willing to follow-up this concern with behavioural actions in support of the environment, particularly when these actions require the individuals to absorb some costs. Using the theoretical framework of commitment–consistency theory, two studies were conducted in order to ...