بررسی رابطه بین مسئولیت اجتماعی شرکت، تصویر برند و ارزش برند در صنعت بانکداری ایران Exploring the relationship between corporate social responsibility, brand image and brand equity in Iranian banking industry

1. Introduction The increased competition in today’s world has made marketers to focus more on branding strategies and build and protect loyal customers by providing high values (Hameed, 2013). As the competition gets more intense, managers face challenges to adjust their brands with the changing expectations of customers (Ghodeswar, 2008). The influence of recent corporate scandals has been led to the formation of a hostile social movement against large businesses. As a result, in response to the increased public surveillance and expectations of stakeholders, companies tend to change their internal strategies to commit to the society and avoid customers’ backlash (Grossman, 2005). Traditionally, companies have paid more attention to their internal stakeholders. But, nowadays most companies are concerned about both internal and external stakeholders (Mark-Herbert and Schantz, 2007). Corporate social responsibility could be regarded as representing a highprofile notion that has strategic importance to many companies (Poolthong and Mandhachitara, 2009). Although, many studies have been done in the field of CSR (e.g. Matute-Vallejo and Bravo, 2011; Marín et al., 2012; Melo and Garrido-Morgado, 2012; Calabrese et al., 2012; He and Lai, 2014; Lii et al., 2013; Pérez and del Bosque, 2015);however, there is still some confusion in the definition of CSR. Most definitions refer to five dimensions include (Dahlsrud, 2008): voluntariness dimension (actions not specified by law); stakeholder dimension (stakeholders or stakeholder group); economic dimension (financial or socio-economic aspects); social dimension (the relationship between society and business); and environmental dimension (the natural environment). Research has shown that people care about the accountability of companies. For example, based on the results of one study, CSR has a significant role in the employment decisions of students in the future. Half of the participants claimed that they would not apply for a job to an irresponsible company (Papafloratos, 2009). Corporate social responsibility can be considered as a marketing tool (Garcı´a de los Salmones et al., 2005). Engaging in suitable CSR initiatives leads to more favorable attitudes among the company’s stakeholders (Poolthong and Mandhachitara, 2009).