Customer Value Perception: Understanding Customer Response to Company’s CSR Initiatives

Abstract

This chapter sets out to assess how the customer perception of CSR initiatives can influence customer value perception and therewith has the potential to affect ethical consumerism through the mediation variable of prioritisation of CSR initiatives. The main concepts used are customer perception of CSR initiatives based on CSR beliefs, customer lifestyle and values to extract the customer relevant CSR initiatives mediating the customer value perception. The multi-dimensionality of the value concept is explained and is firstly used to evaluate the value enhancing effects of relevant CSR initiatives and secondly, to differentiate the effect that different value categories have on customers’ attitude and behaviour. It is suggested that CSR initiatives, when communicated efficiently and considered as relevant by the customers, will enhance primarily two customer value categories—the extrinsic self-oriented value and the intrinsic other-oriented value. Enhancement of extrinsic self-oriented value imbeds the potential to affect customers’ purchase behaviour and thus strengthen ethical consumerism. There are two main contributions of this chapter—the academic contribution is grounded in the indication that prioritisation of CSR initiatives mediates the customer value perception as a necessary precondition for ethical consumerism. The contribution to the industry is to help the industry to understand how customers perceive different CSR initiatives and which factors lead to the prioritisation of CSR initiatives from customers’ perspective.