Antecedents and Outcomes of Identity Prominence in Relationship Marketing: A Perspective of Social Enterprises

Purpose: In social enterprises, developing long-run relationships with stakeholders is a viable strategy. Nonetheless, for social enterprises relationship-marketing success may be based crucially on distinct relationship characteristics such as identity prominence. The purpose of this study was to identify the role of identity prominence in relationship marketing success in the context of social enterprise business. Research design, data, and methodology: Drawing both on the social exchange theory and on the identity theory, we developed a model explaining and predicting a social enterprise’s success. Specifically, the model presented that a social enterprise’s identity prominence is useful for relationship marketing success in the enterprise. Results: First, social enterprise identity prominence is related positively to donating and promoting to the social enterprise. Donors’ participation in social enterprise activities, perceived prestige, and satisfaction are related positively to the social enterprise identity prominence, respectively. Implications: Our results indicated that managers in social enterprises should focus on increasing the prominence of their donors’ social enterprise-related identity and developing such identities in plausible donors. These works enable stakeholders to become more actively involved in social enterprise-related activities in addition to maintaining and, if plausible, improving the prestige of the social enterprise. These factors are associated with building a social enterprise-related identity and encouraging stakeholders to develop one, which thereby allows them to promote and donate to the social enterprise in the future.