IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/hal/journl/hal-04744294.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Why do consumers respond negatively to brand activism campaigns ? An investigation into the perceived corporate motives

Author

Listed:
  • Charlotte Lécuyer

    (CleRMa - Clermont Recherche Management - ESC Clermont-Ferrand - École Supérieure de Commerce (ESC) - Clermont-Ferrand - UCA [2017-2020] - Université Clermont Auvergne [2017-2020])

  • Marine Kergoat

    (UJM - Université Jean Monnet - Saint-Étienne)

  • Christine Lambey-Checchin

    (CleRMa - Clermont Recherche Management - ESC Clermont-Ferrand - École Supérieure de Commerce (ESC) - Clermont-Ferrand - UCA [2017-2020] - Université Clermont Auvergne [2017-2020])

Abstract

This research investigates the corporate motives consumers attribute to brand activism campaigns. In two studies, we examine why brand activism adverts generate negative outcomes (which are attitude toward the ad and purchase intentions) through the mediating role of corporate motives. Firstly, a qualitative study shows that consumers associate brand activism with two main corporate motives: moral (altruistic) and instrumental (profit-making) motives. Secondly, a 2 (message type: activism vs. no activism) x 2 (brand: Burger King vs. Audi) between-subjects design, confirms that brand activism adverts lead to lower attitude towards the ad and lower purchase intentions. Brands should be careful when using brand activism messages in their advertising as consumers associate these messages with both profit-making and egoistic motives.

Suggested Citation

  • Charlotte Lécuyer & Marine Kergoat & Christine Lambey-Checchin, 2023. "Why do consumers respond negatively to brand activism campaigns ? An investigation into the perceived corporate motives," Post-Print hal-04744294, HAL.
    • Handle: RePEc:hal:journl:hal-04744294
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    To our knowledge, this item is not available for download. To find whether it is available, there are three options:
    1. Check below whether another version of this item is available online.
    2. Check on the provider's web page whether it is in fact available.
    3. Perform a search for a similarly titled item that would be available.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. P. De Pelsmacker & M. Geuens & P. Anckaert, 2002. "Media context and advertising effectiveness: The role of context appreciation and context-ad similarity," Working Papers of Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, Ghent University, Belgium 02/162, Ghent University, Faculty of Economics and Business Administration.
    2. Becker-Olsen, Karen L. & Cudmore, B. Andrew & Hill, Ronald Paul, 2006. "The impact of perceived corporate social responsibility on consumer behavior," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 59(1), pages 46-53, January.
    3. Alexander Chernev & Sean Blair, 2015. "Doing Well by Doing Good: The Benevolent Halo of Corporate Social Responsibility," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 41(6), pages 1412-1425.
    4. Alhouti, Sarah & Johnson, Catherine M. & Holloway, Betsy Bugg, 2016. "Corporate social responsibility authenticity: Investigating its antecedents and outcomes," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 69(3), pages 1242-1249.
    5. Holt, Douglas B, 2002. "Why Do Brands Cause Trouble? A Dialectical Theory of Consumer Culture and Branding," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 29(1), pages 70-90, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Chris Hydock & Neeru Paharia & T. J. Weber, 2019. "The Consumer Response to Corporate Political Advocacy: a Review and Future Directions," Customer Needs and Solutions, Springer;Institute for Sustainable Innovation and Growth (iSIG), vol. 6(3), pages 76-83, December.
    2. Alhouti, Sarah & Wright, Scott A. & Baker, Thomas L., 2021. "Customers need to relate: The conditional warm glow effect of CSR on negative customer experiences," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 124(C), pages 240-253.
    3. Anat Toder‐Alon & Eyal Rosenstreich & Tali Te'eni Harari, 2019. "Give or take? Consumers' ambivalent perspectives on the relationship between a firm's corporate social responsibility engagement and its responsible tax payments," Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 26(4), pages 872-884, July.
    4. Virginia S. Harrison & Michail Vafeiadis & Joseph Bober, 2022. "Greening Professional Sport: How Communicating the Fit, Proximity, and Impact of Sustainability Efforts Affects Fan Perceptions and Supportive Intentions," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(6), pages 1-21, March.
    5. Chang-Hyun Jin & Jung-Yong Lee, 2019. "The Halo Effect of CSR Activity: Types of CSR Activity and Negative Information Effects," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(7), pages 1-20, April.
    6. Aleena Amir & Muhammad Usman, 2024. "Understanding the Influence of Perceived Authenticity of Femvertising on Consumer Buycott Intentions: A Moderated Mediation Model of Consumers’ Extrinsic Attributions and Power Distance," Bulletin of Business and Economics (BBE), Research Foundation for Humanity (RFH), vol. 13(3), pages 273-281.
    7. Menno D. T. Jong & Mark Meer, 2017. "How Does It Fit? Exploring the Congruence Between Organizations and Their Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Activities," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 143(1), pages 71-83, June.
    8. Wallach, Karen Anne & Popovich, Deidre, 2023. "When Big Is Less than Small: Why dominant brands lack authenticity in their sustainability initiatives," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 158(C).
    9. Ahmad, Fayez & Guzmán, Francisco & Al-Emran, Md, 2024. "Brand activism and the consequence of woke washing," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 170(C).
    10. Dongho Yoo & Jieun Lee, 2018. "The Effects of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Fit and CSR Consistency on Company Evaluation: The Role of CSR Support," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(8), pages 1-16, August.
    11. Michal Carrington & Andreas Chatzidakis & Helen Goworek & Deirdre Shaw, 2021. "Consumption Ethics: A Review and Analysis of Future Directions for Interdisciplinary Research," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 168(2), pages 215-238, January.
    12. Chang-Dae Ham & Jeesun Kim, 2019. "The Role of CSR in Crises: Integration of Situational Crisis Communication Theory and the Persuasion Knowledge Model," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 158(2), pages 353-372, August.
    13. Ponce de Leon, Rebecca & Carter, James T. & Rosette, Ashleigh Shelby, 2024. "Sincere solidarity or performative pretense? Evaluations of organizational allyship," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 180(C).
    14. Nick Lin-Hi & Marlene Reimer & Katharina Schäfer & Johanna Böttcher, 2023. "Consumer acceptance of cultured meat: an empirical analysis of the role of organizational factors," Journal of Business Economics, Springer, vol. 93(4), pages 707-746, May.
    15. Pino, Giovanni & Nieto Garcia, Marta & Peluso, Alessandro M. & Viglia, Giampaolo & Filieri, Raffaele, 2023. "Understanding how virtuous lenders encourage support for peer-to-peer platforms’ prosocial initiatives," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 168(C).
    16. Alhouti, Sarah & Johnson, Catherine M. & Holloway, Betsy Bugg, 2016. "Corporate social responsibility authenticity: Investigating its antecedents and outcomes," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 69(3), pages 1242-1249.
    17. Jing Yu & Changjun Jiang & Xiaohong Zhuang & Sanggyun Na & Zongmin Cui, 2020. "The Formation Mechanism of Consumer Perceived Corporate Social Responsibility Authenticity: An Empirical Study of Chinese Consumers," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(6), pages 1-22, March.
    18. Scott Connors & Stephen Anderson-MacDonald & Matthew Thomson, 2017. "Overcoming the ‘Window Dressing’ Effect: Mitigating the Negative Effects of Inherent Skepticism Towards Corporate Social Responsibility," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 145(3), pages 599-621, October.
    19. Kolcava, Dennis, 2020. "Do citizens hold business accountable for greenwashing by demanding more government intervention?," OSF Preprints sj4dk, Center for Open Science.
    20. Sojin Jung & Daeun Chloe Shin & Hongjoo Woo & Byoungho Ellie Jin, 2024. "The spillover effects of positive and negative corporate social responsibility publicity: How and why the effect is lessened versus amplified," Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 31(3), pages 2086-2097, May.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:hal:journl:hal-04744294. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: CCSD (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.