Hold me responsible: The role of corporate social responsibility and corporate reputation for client-perceived value

Abstract

Purpose

Corporate communication practices are becoming ever more important for business service clients, as they signal quality and hence are related to client-perceived value. The purpose of this paper is to examine the interplay between corporate social responsibility (CSR), corporate reputation and client-perceived value, and to assess the moderating role of strategic orientation in business service relationships.

Design/methodology/approach

The conceptual framework based on the corporate communication framework, signaling theory and relationship marketing theory has been tested on a survey sample of 228 client firms, using covariance-based SEM and additional procedures for assessment of mediation and moderated mediation.

Findings

This paper reveals that communication practices concerning CSR positively and significantly influence client-perceived value. The authors show that reputation fully mediates the effect of CSR on client-perceived value. Finally, the effect of CSR on value is stronger if the client firm has a short-term strategic orientation, while long-term strategic orientation boosts the effect of corporate reputation on customer-perceived value.

Research limitations/implications

Further research on the topic may involve developing links between other elements of the corporate communication framework and client-perceived value.

Originality/value

The originality of the paper lies in better understanding the effects of CSR and corporate reputation on client-perceived value. The authors provide empirical evidence of the mediating role of reputation between the CSR (seen as “actions”) and client-perceived value.

Citation

Arslanagic-Kalajdzic, M. and Zabkar, V. (2017), "Hold me responsible: The role of corporate social responsibility and corporate reputation for client-perceived value", Corporate Communications: An International Journal, Vol. 22 No. 2, pp. 209-219. https://doi.org/10.1108/CCIJ-01-2016-0012