Optimal cause marketing strategies for online platforms and third-party sellers: A spokes model analysis

Qian Su, Xiaoyang Zhou, Qi Liu and Kai Zhang

Omega, 2025, vol. 133, issue C

Abstract: Under the advocacy of the platform, an increasing number of third-party sellers have implemented cause marketing (CM) strategies. The platform and sellers have achieved cumulative social benefits while pursuing profit. However, not all third-party sellers choose the CM strategy. To better understand the impact of online CM on pricing, profitability, and social welfare, we set up a stylized CM spokes model and analyze the impact of the unit donation amount, the number of cause marketing sellers, and consumers’ warm-glow effect on the optimal CM strategy. We find that the profitability of cause-related products is not always higher than that of non cause-related products when there exists sufficient competition between cause-related and non cause-related products. It is also found that higher unit donation amounts do not necessarily lead to greater total donations and social welfare. Moreover, having more sellers choose CM does not necessarily result in a higher total donation amount. Additionally, we explore another donation form, the donation rate, to determine the best CM strategy for sellers. The results show that a fixed donation is more flexible for sellers. Overall, our findings offer new insights into how platforms and sellers can optimally implement CM strategies.

Keywords: Cause marketing; Oligopoly competition; Corporate social responsibility; Pricing strategy; Spokes model (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0305048324002354
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

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:eee:jomega:v:133:y:2025:i:c:s0305048324002354

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/supportfaq.cws_home/regional
https://shop.elsevie ... _01_ooc_1&version=01

DOI: 10.1016/j.omega.2024.103271

Access Statistics for this article

Omega is currently edited by B. Lev

More articles in Omega from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().