Publicação
Sustainability & crisis management : a valuable link to regain consumer trust and purchase intention : a case on Audi AG
| Resumo: | Throughout the past years, companies have increasingly faced performance-related crises due to rising complexity of customer needs and external requirements. In light of these issues, existing academic research has investigated the effectiveness of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) in countering firm’s negative publicity. Yet, consumers tend to express their scepticism towards organisational CSR efforts and accuse firms of green-washing. Conversely to CSR, corporate sustainability initiatives are less likely to be perceived as greenwashing, as they necessitate long-term investments and irreversible changes of business processes. Hence, the aim of the present thesis is to examine the effectiveness of corporate sustainability in countering negative publicity. More specifically, this paper evaluates whether Audi’s sustainability strategy enables the firm to regain consumer trust and increase purchase intention after the Diesel Emission Issue. Therefore, based on theoretical and practical considerations, an online experimental study was conducted. Results show that presenting individuals with information on firms’ initiatives associated with “Employees & Society” as well as “Operations & Integrity” increase consumer trust levels. Moreover, Audi’s sustainability strategy results in significantly higher levels of purchase intention. Hence, the present dissertation contributes preliminarily research findings to a yet very limited stream of research and holds important practical implications, especially for Audi AG, in terms of how sustainability efforts can be effectively implemented as part of the crisis communication strategy. |
|---|---|
| Autores principais: | Schäfer, Clarissa Christina |
| Ano: | 2017 |
| País: | Portugal |
| Tipo de documento: | dissertação de mestrado |
| Tipo de acesso: | acesso aberto |
| Instituição associada: | Universidade Católica Portuguesa |
| Idioma: | inglês |
| Origem: | Veritati - Repositório Institucional da Universidade Católica Portuguesa |
| Resumo: | Throughout the past years, companies have increasingly faced performance-related crises due to rising complexity of customer needs and external requirements. In light of these issues, existing academic research has investigated the effectiveness of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) in countering firm’s negative publicity. Yet, consumers tend to express their scepticism towards organisational CSR efforts and accuse firms of green-washing. Conversely to CSR, corporate sustainability initiatives are less likely to be perceived as greenwashing, as they necessitate long-term investments and irreversible changes of business processes. Hence, the aim of the present thesis is to examine the effectiveness of corporate sustainability in countering negative publicity. More specifically, this paper evaluates whether Audi’s sustainability strategy enables the firm to regain consumer trust and increase purchase intention after the Diesel Emission Issue. Therefore, based on theoretical and practical considerations, an online experimental study was conducted. Results show that presenting individuals with information on firms’ initiatives associated with “Employees & Society” as well as “Operations & Integrity” increase consumer trust levels. Moreover, Audi’s sustainability strategy results in significantly higher levels of purchase intention. Hence, the present dissertation contributes preliminarily research findings to a yet very limited stream of research and holds important practical implications, especially for Audi AG, in terms of how sustainability efforts can be effectively implemented as part of the crisis communication strategy. |
|---|