Building brand meaning in social entrepreneurship organizations: the social impact brand model

Florian Lückenbach (), Holger J. Schmidt () and Jörg Henseler ()
Additional contact information
Florian Lückenbach: Koblenz University of Applied Sciences
Holger J. Schmidt: Koblenz University of Applied Sciences
Jörg Henseler: University of Twente

Journal of Brand Management, 2023, vol. 30, issue 3, No 3, 207-226

Abstract: Abstract In the face of numerous complex challenges at the ecological, economic, and social levels, Social Entrepreneurship Organizations (SEOs) offer an approach that is both solution-oriented and future-oriented by combining profitability and purpose. However, the achievement of social goals is closely linked to the ability to operate successfully in competitive environments, in which differentiation strategies, in particular the creation of strong and authentic brands, are vital to survival. Although the new paradigm of brand management, the so-called co-creative paradigm, has been extensively researched in recent decades both in the for-profit and non-profit contexts, there is still scarce empirical research addressing the field of SEOs. To exploit the potential that the co-creation paradigm offers for SEOs, our paper introduces a social impact brand model (SIBM), which sheds new light on the design process of social entrepreneurial brand meaning. The findings identify key drivers in creating SEO brands by focusing on a dual-brand core that consists of an impact mission orientation and an entrepreneurial orientation, internal branding activities, the founder's personal brand, and relevant brand (co-)creators. By aligning their brand management activities with the SIBM, SEOs can create brands that have authentic and stable brand meanings while managing stakeholder groups' various expectations.

Keywords: Social entrepreneurship organizations; Brand management; Brand co-creation; Social branding; Social entrepreneurial brand meaning (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1057/s41262-022-00299-1 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pal:jobman:v:30:y:2023:i:3:d:10.1057_s41262-022-00299-1

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.palgrave.com/gp/journal/41262

DOI: 10.1057/s41262-022-00299-1

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Brand Management is currently edited by Joachim Kernstock, Shaun M. Powell, Mark Davies and Ur a Golob

More articles in Journal of Brand Management from Palgrave Macmillan
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().