Doing Good, Choosing Better: Perceived Value and Consumer Intentions

Abstract

While purchasing, customers happily encounter prosocial activities when any social cause is related to a brand's promotional activity. Purchase-triggered donation initiatives represent a widely used form of cause-related marketing; however, limited scholarly attention has been given to how differentially the framing of such donations as gains or losses shapes consumers’ intentions. Furthermore, this study investigates the mediating role of perceived value in explaining these effects. A between-subject experimental design was employed in which 320 participants were exposed to either a gain-framed or a loss-framed purchase-triggered donation message presented within a simulated coffee brand communication. Drawing on the elaboration likelihood model, the findings reveal that gain-framed purchase-triggered donation messages lead to stronger intentions to purchase compared to loss-framed messages. Moreover, perceived value significantly mediates the relationship between donation framing and purchase intention, indicating that consumers’ perceptions of a brand’s selfless motives play a critical role in shaping their behavioral intentions. This study contributes to the cause-related marketing literature by demonstrating that gain-framed (vs. loss-framed) purchase-triggered donation messages more effectively enhance consumers’ purchase intentions through heightened perceived value.