Would Corporate Social Responsibility Affect Consumers’ Attitudes towards Brand and Purchase Behavior? Buyer-seller Guanxi as the Moderator

Autori:

Tung-Ju WU, Hsien-Tang TSAI, Yu-Nan TAI

Cod: ISSN: 1583-3410 (print), ISSN: 1584-5397 (electronic)
Dimensiuni: pp. 272-287

How to cite this article:

Wu, T.J., Tsai, H.T., Tai, Y.N. (2016). Would Corporate Social Responsibility Affect Consumers’ Attitudes towards Brand and Purchase Behavior? Buyer-seller Guanxi as the Moderator. Revista de Cercetare si Interventie Sociala, 53, 272-287.

Abstract:

Corporate social responsibility is a critical strategy for enterprises proceeding marketing planning on either brand promotion or image building. Nevertheless, the past research on corporate social responsibility rarely mentioned about the effect on purchase intention. Attitudes towards brand, brand image, and consumers’ purchase intention are integrated in this study to construct the major research model, and a scale is developed from the special perspective of Chinese culture to measure the buyer-seller guanxi between enterprises and customers. Aiming at the coffee shop chain of Starbucks, the consumers are proceeded the questionnaire survey, and total 673 valid copies of questionnaire are retrieved. The SEM analysis results show significantly positive relations between corporate social responsibility and purchase intention, partially mediating effects of attitudes towards brand and brand image on the relations between corporate social responsibility and purchase intention, and moderating effects of buyer-seller guanxi on the relations between corporate social responsibility and purchase intention. Corporate social responsibility should not simply stress on the external activities of an enterprise, but should also pay attention to internal employees’ working environment and training. It is suggested that an enterprise exchanging consumers with emotional appeal to have consumers understand that they do not simply acquire favorable products or services from the enterprise, but also realize the mission and goals of the enterprise.