Title: Cause-related marketing: uncovering the myth

Authors: Mehran Nejati; Azlan Amran; Gwen Tan Yi Wen

Addresses: Graduate School of Business (GSB), Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM), Minden Heights, Penang 1800, Malaysia ' Graduate School of Business (GSB), Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM), Minden Heights, Penang 1800, Malaysia ' Graduate School of Business (GSB), Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM), Minden Heights, Penang 1800, Malaysia

Abstract: In accordance with companies' efforts to position themselves as socially responsible firms, the application of Cause-Related Marketing (CRM) has been growing as a helpful marketing tool. Nonetheless, there is a dearth of significant prior studies in understanding what factors influence the success of such prosocial marketing campaigns and their impacts on consumers' purchase intentions. This research attempts to investigate the influence of perceived cause importance, cause proximity, cause-brand fit and consumers' involvement in CRM on consumers' purchasing intention. Findings of the study indicate the positive and significant impact of cause importance, cause proximity, and cause-brand fit on consumers' purchase intentions, while consumers' involvement in CRM was not found to have any significant role to play. Study limitations and implications have also been outlined in the paper.

Keywords: cause-related marketing; prosocial marketing; cause importance; cause proximity; consumer involvement; cause-brand fit; purchase intention; socially responsible; social responsibility.

DOI: 10.1504/IJMP.2015.068301

International Journal of Management Practice, 2015 Vol.8 No.1, pp.57 - 69

Received: 22 Feb 2014
Accepted: 20 Jun 2014
Published online: 29 Mar 2015 *

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