Doing good does not always lead to doing well: the corrective, compensating and cultivating goodwill CSR effects on brand defense

Abstract

ABSTRACT This study investigated the relative impacts of three corporate social responsibility (CSR) types – namely corrective, compensating and cultivating CSR – on brand defense by considering customer–company’s (C–C’s) identification mediation role and CSR authenticity’s moderation role in these relationships. A between-subject experiment was conducted on 573 coffee shop customers in the United States. The findings revealed corrective CSR is the strongest brand defense predictor, followed by compensating and cultivating CSR. The CSR types’ relative effects are mediated by C–C identification, and as such, compensating CSR’s indirect effects on brand defense through C–C identification are stronger than cultivating CSR’s indirect effects on brand defense. When the CSR authenticity level is high, cultivating CSR has a significant indirect effect – through C–C identification – on brand defense that is stronger than when the CSR authenticity level is low. When the level is high, compensating CSR has an insignificant indirect effect – through C–C identification – on brand defense, similar to when the level is low. Finally, findings on moderated mediation revealed the indirect relationship between the three CSR types on brand defense – through C–C identification – is moderated by CSR authenticity.