Australasian Marketing Journal

The world is facing an environmental crisis. Long-term environmental sustainability requires social change: individuals need to take personal responsibility for the environment and change their behaviour. Environmental volunteering organisations play a key role in this process: they create opportunities for individuals to improve their natural environment, they facilitate behavioural change. Successful facilitation of behavioural change requires in-depth understanding of the environmental volunteering market to identify those individuals most likely to volunteer, compete successfully and create targeted, motivating marketing campaigns.

The present study (1) assesses the usefulness of a novel method (PBMS) to explore volunteering markets, and (2) provides insight into the Australian environmental volunteering market structure. Results indicate PBMS analysis provides unique insights into the volunteering market with respect to image, competition and suitable market segments. The environmental volunteering organisation considered in this study, Bushcare, is perceived as “outdoorsy”, “Aussie” and “supporting local community” and competes primarily with Surf Life Saving and the Rural Fire Service for volunteers.

This paper considers whether the concept of corporate social responsibility (CSR) is sufficient for social behavioural change. Two data sources are used to consider whether alcohol is enjoyed responsibly in Australia by informed adults. First, 582 surveys were analysed to consider whether respondents were adequately informed about alcohol. Second, covert observations were used to record what people actually drink to understand whether alcohol is always enjoyed responsibly. Taken together, the results suggest many adults are not adequately informed and many Australian adults do not enjoy alcohol responsibly. A more rigorous social responsibility approach may be warranted. To achieve sustained behavioural change companies need to move towards corporate social performance (CSP). CSP requires CSR interventions to be evaluated to determine their contribution towards real social gains. CSR is not enough to reach the social goals required by society. The concept of CSP takes away the lip service around CSR by requiring companies to document sustained behavioural change.

Australian and international governments are increasingly adopting social marketing as a social change management tool to deal with complex social problems. Government decision makers typically need to balance the use of business models and management theories whilst maintaining the integrity of government policy. In taking this approach, decision makers experience management tensions between a social mission to equitably deliver social services and the accountability and affordability of providing quality social and health services to citizens. This is a significant challenge as the nature of the ‘social product’ in government is often more service-oriented than goods-based. In this paper the authors examine value creation in government social marketing services. The contribution of this paper is a value creation process model, which considers the nature of governments to create social good. This is particularly important for governments where consumers still expect value and quality in the service delivered, despite that offering being ‘free’.

The main purpose of this study is the identification of issues from a consumer perspective that can assist in the creation of sustainable museums. This work specifically focuses on customer research including the service encounter experience. It has been suggested museum sustainability is questionable in the long term, with a need for fundamental change in the mental modes and attitudes assumed in the management of the sector, in particular the need for more effective and appropriate marketing strategies. Adopting a qualitative research approach, twenty consultant customers kept a service encounter diary and were subsequently interviewed in-depth. These scripts were analyzed thematically until theoretical saturation was achieved. Findings indicate many issues focusing on the creation of reflective spaces, self-paced consumption, solitude versus social exchange, the need for supplementary service to be more effectively developed, improvement in non custodial servicescapes and the relationships of satisfaction to process and amenities. Implications for management and research have been highlighted.

Success in social marketing is rarely clear cut and even more rarely believed to have been achieved. Social marketing practitioners are under increasing scrutiny to benchmark efficiencies of social change programs to achieve ‘success’ outcomes. Using road safety as a case study, this paper addresses the complex nature of success within a social marketing context. First, we discuss the conundrum facing road safety in articulating ‘success’ when at policy level success is quantified objectively, yet at a community level perceptions of system failure are equated with individual death. Methodologically we apply comparative empirical approaches to examine perceptual versus objective road safety outcomes. The paper concludes with a discussion and proposal of alternate strategies for measuring programmatic success, and raise issues concerning the longevity of developing competitive and sustainable benchmarks.

This paper presents a unique city branding case applying narrative analysis to the marketing manager's account of his long running campaign to brand Logan City. The analysis finds that the campaign has many of the hallmarks of social marketing, but focuses strongly on citizen's positive self image and social capital development. Elements of city branding are employed but the approach is ‘self directed’, rather than the usual approach of ‘other directed’. The desired outcomes are a positive self and community image laying the foundation for a community confident to undertake various economic development tasks. Implications for social marketing theory and management and future research are discussed.

This research investigates Australian consumers’ understanding of healthy eating campaigns. A CATI survey was administered to 834 adults across Australia. Participants were asked about their own understanding of the term ‘healthy eating’, the credibility of different advertisers, who they believed should be responsible for healthy eating campaigns and who they trusted to do so. Results indicate that the majority of participants have a basic understanding of ‘healthy eating’. Non-government organisations were viewed as being the most credible and best placed to develop and run healthy eating campaigns; and participants believed there is a need for monitoring healthy eating campaigns for truthfulness and accuracy. Given the significance of overweight and obesity levels in Australia, a collaborative approach between the health industry, the commercial food industry and the media and advertising sectors is required in the development and delivery of improved healthy eating messages to encourage better (sustained) food choices and as a result, improved nutritional status of the community.