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The purpose of this research is to extend the results of previous studies regarding corporate reputation scales and identify new and specific items relevant for studying global corporate reputation from a customer’s point of view.

This research was based on the qualitative projective “Album on Line” (AOL) technique. The authors used a sample of 12 French consumers distributed equally between affective and cognitive scenarios. An individual-difference multidimensional scaling approach (INDSCAL) was applied to display the overall semantic space among generated items.

The exploratory AOL approach generated 62 items related to both cognitive and affective orientations characterizing online and offline corporate reputation. The results uncovered six semantic clusters for each scenario. All in all, seven new items could be added in the process of building a new global corporate reputation measurement scale by adding: avant-garde, singularity, exclusivity, savings, return policy, freeness and speed.

This research makes it possible to propose a new global corporate reputation measurement scale with sound psychometric properties. This scale will be adapted for click and mortars and pure players. This paper unlocks future perspectives by suggesting a causal model that integrates online corporate reputation and its main antecedents and consequences.

From a managerial perspective, this research offers insights to managers with the main orientations surrounding the components of global corporate reputation. Moreover, the AOL mappings delineate which quadrants the managers would like to be fitted into or avoid, and hence define more precisely which key elements should be stressed or discarded.

This research outlines AOL, an original qualitative projective technique that can be used to understand customers’ thoughts, which are stocked and collected as images. Moreover, this research intends to analyze the gathered data using both INDSCAL and fuzzy k-means cluster analysis to reduce conventional biases related to subjectivity.

Customer loyalty is of growing interest to many service firms due to the many tangible and intangible benefits it offers them. However, building customer loyalty is challenging for many service firms. This study aims to examine the impact of corporate reputation on customer loyalty. It also assesses the moderating role of the firm's country of origin in this relationship.

Survey research design was used to collect data from 367 universal banks' customers. Data were analysed using structural equation modelling.

The findings shed light on several crucial aspects of corporate reputation that influence customer loyalty. Specifically, signals of corporate social responsibility, corporate credibility, product attributes and relationship marketing were found to have a substantial impact on customer loyalty. Additionally, the study uncovers a noteworthy insight that the firm's country of origin plays a moderating role in the relationship between corporate reputation and customer loyalty, particularly in the context of the banking sector.

This research stands out due to its utilisation of signalling theory, making it one of the pioneering works in the bank brand management literature. It presents a comprehensive corporate reputation framework and its profound implications for customer loyalty. Furthermore, the study underscores the significance of considering the strength of the country-of-origin effect in shaping customer loyalty relationships.

This study aims to explore the mediating effect of the top-performing environmental, sustainability and governance (ESG) company’s corporate reputation and sustainability practices in translating corporate social responsibility (CSR) practices into competitive performance in an emerging economy like India.

The hypotheses proposed for this study were validated using partial least squares-based structural equation modeling on data obtained from the chief financial officers of the 122 top-performing ESG companies in India using a self-administered questionnaire.

According to the findings of this research, the relationship between CSR practices and the competitive performance of the top-performing ESG companies in India is partially mediated by corporate reputation and sustainability practices.

The findings of this study indicate that the corporate reputation of a company and sustainability measures accepted by an organization can improve an organization’s competitive position. Because there has been so little research done on India, this study has the potential to be regarded as a pioneering effort. It can provide a foundation for businesses operating in India to improve their competitive advantage by emphasizing their corporate reputation and sustainable business practices in addition to the CSR activities undertaken.

This study aims to analyze how sustainability, through an efficient knowledge management (KM) system, can serve as a driving force with respect to corporate culture and reputation. The research questions that guided this study are mainly the following: Are KM and sustainability related? Can culture strengthen the link between KM and sustainability? Can the link between KM and sustainability be affected by reputation?

The methodological approach adopted corresponds to qualitative research of analysis on the reference literature in the international field, also supported by empirical analysis.

In this study, the authors show that there is no explicit correlation between sustainability and KM. This relationship, in fact, is not underlined in nonfinancial reporting because it is absent or because it is not considered relevant. Too often sustainability is reduced to a mere relational and reputational tool, ignoring the fact it must be considered a consequence and not the main goal to improve companies’ culture.

The sample studied by the authors refers to the top 40 companies listed on the Italian market, not allowing to generalize the findings across the international context.

The practical implications that could result from making explicit the relationship between sustainability and KM are multiple: the substantial benefits of the reputational aspect, an increase in the economic value related to sustainability; to ensure the going concern of the company and implement its ability to produce and share value in the long term.

The social benefits of a stronger relationship between sustainability and KM are related to the possibility to improve the wealth of all the stakeholders.

This paper analyzes the links between sustainability and KM to understand the influence of these factors on corporate culture and reputation.

The appraisal of corporate reputation based on third-party corporate social responsibility (CSR) indices appears to have been institutionalized. The endorsement of such an approach by sustainability custodians and influencers undermines the uptake of the morality and legitimacy of CSR. This study takes a social realist perspective, which suggests that social phenomena such as CSR and corporate reputation are shaped by social structures and power relations. This study aims to contribute to a deeper understanding of the complex relationship between CSR and corporate reputation and understand ways in which the constructs are influenced by cognitive factors.

This study surveyed 411 respondents across five shopping malls and analyzed the data using path analysis of the structural equation modeling (SEM) technique. The mall-intercept survey sought to critically assess expectations of CSR vis-à-vis evaluation of corporate reputation. Based on a case study of three Johannesburg Stock Exchange listed companies, CSR expectations were measured along the philanthropic, economic, ethical and legal dimensions, while evaluation of corporate reputation was based on product quality, financial performance and social responsibility. SEM path analysis was used to extrapolate the predictive outcomes of CSR on corporate reputation.

Reputation for product quality and social responsibility is underpinned by the fulfillment of ethical CSR expectations, while philanthropic gestures enhance the evaluation of financial performance. Legal CSR significantly influences the reputation for social responsibility and product quality. Fulfillment of economic CSR expectations influences the reputation for product quality. However, no relationship was established between economic performance and social responsibility. Involvement in economic, philanthropic and particularly, legal CSR, are not indicative of the reputation for financial performance. Conversely, companies’ involvement in economic CSR does not suggest a higher propensity for social responsibility.

The predictive outcomes of CSR expectations on corporate reputation can reveal situated understanding of actual perceptions of corporate behavior.

Ethical business conduct is synonymously associated with social responsibility while espoused corporate philanthropy signals strong financial performance. The awareness of consumers’ cognitive evaluation of corporate reputation can offer a pathway to corporate communication professionals, policy makers and agencies to rethink and reposition CSR efforts.

Insensitivity to taken-for-granted cultural prescriptions and reliance on market-based reputational rankings undermine mutually beneficial stakeholder relationships and the social license to operate.

This study brings to the fore, cognitively dominated indicators of consumers’ perceptions of the reputation for CSR, to foster nuanced and halo-removed approaches to social responsibility. The authors show for the first time how companies’ skewed focus on corporate philanthropic giving paradoxically signals a capitalistic notion of social responsibility and unethical business conduct. This study offers a halo-removed orientation to the appraisal of CSR and corporate reputation.

Once a corporate crisis is entangled with a social issue, how consumers make sense of the crisis can be impacted by issue-based opinion polarization. This study investigates the underlying mechanisms as consumers go through this process. This study also examines whether corporate social advocacy (CSA) can be an effective crisis-response strategy for mitigating reputational loss.

Theoretical inquiries were empirically tested using an online experiment (N = 792). The experiment set the context in China, in a working-overtime-issue-related crisis. It had a 2 (online exposure: anti-issue opinion vs. pro-issue opinion) × 2 (CSA: absence vs. presence) between-subject design with a continuous variable (pre-existing issue attitudes) measured before the manipulation.

This study found that pre-existing issue attitudes can be directly and indirectly associated with corporate reputation, for the issue attitudes influence how consumers attribute crisis blame. Such a direct effect of pre-existing issue attitudes varies depending on which polarized opinion consumers were exposed to on social media. This study also found CSA to be a robust crisis response strategy, through multiple mechanisms, in protecting the corporate reputation.

Scholars are scarcely aware of the threats that issue-based opinion polarization poses to corporate reputation. This study serves as an early attempt to provide theoretical explanations. In addition to this, this study extends the current conceptual understandings of CSA during corporate crises that involve social issues while adding fresh insights into the established typology of crisis-response strategies.

High-quality workforce is the most important source for competitive advantage, and thus all organizations attempt to attract and recruit young talents. This study aims to examine the relationships between corporate social responsibility (CSR), corporate reputation and intention to apply for a job in young individuals.

For empirical analysis, this study uses data collected from final-year students and fresh graduates in a developing city. This study uses structural equation modelling (SEM) to test the research model.

CSR is found to be positively and directly associated with intention to apply for a job. CSR is also positively and indirectly associated with intention to apply through the mediation of corporate reputation.

This study underscores the importance of CSR practices in enhancing corporate reputation and attracting talented young candidates. Accordingly, organizations can gain their competitive edge in a highly competitive environment.

This study suggests that organizations should be more concerned about CSR practices for the sake of corporate reputation as well as community development.

This study is among the early attempts to examine the direct and indirect relationships between CSR, corporate reputation and intention to apply for a job in a developing city. The findings add to the growing literature suggesting that CSR may help organizations achieve competitive advantage regarding the attraction of prospective young talents.

Customer co-creation behaviors significantly affect a firm's performance and sustainable growth. This study tested the mediating role of corporate reputation in the relationship between corporate hypocrisy and two types of customer co-creation behaviors: customer citizenship behavior and customer participation behavior. The study also investigated the moderating effect of self-corporate brand connection on the corporate hypocrisy–corporate reputation relationship and the indirect relationship between corporate hypocrisy and customer co-creation behavior through corporate reputation.

The authors conducted a two-wave research survey with 346 Korean bank customers and tested our hypotheses using PROCESS Macro.

Corporate reputation mediated the relationship between corporate hypocrisy and customer citizenship/participant behavior. The negative effect of corporate hypocrisy on corporate reputation was more pronounced when self-corporate brand connection was high. Self-corporate brand connection further moderated the indirect effect of corporate hypocrisy on customer citizenship/participant behavior through corporate reputation.

The results clearly explain how corporate hypocrisy affects customer co-creation behavior. This study advances corporate hypocrisy and corporate reputation research by proposing and verifying a moderated mediation model.

The growing relevance of environmental sustainability calls for identification of factors that contribute to green innovation and build green corporate reputation. Drawing on the resource-based view theory, this study aims to explore the influence of green logistics knowledge, green customer knowledge, green supplier knowledge, green competitor knowledge, non-supply chain learning on green innovation and green corporate reputation.

This study adopts the quantitative research method where questionnaire is used to gather data from managers of the sampled 208 small and medium enterprises (SMEs). The structural equation modelling is used to analyse the survey data and test the proposed hypotheses.

The findings reveal that non-supply chain learning, green customer knowledge and green competitor knowledge have both direct and indirect impact on green innovation and green corporate reputation. However, green supplier knowledge and green logistics knowledge directly impact green innovation but indirectly impact green corporate reputation through green innovation.

Despite the growing literature exploring the relationship between learning, innovation and reputation, their literature in emerging economies remains underdeveloped. This study provides empirical evidence to confirm the role of non-supply chain learning and green supply chain knowledge in building green corporate reputation and developing green innovation of SMEs in an emerging economy.

Employer branding is a topic that has gained relevance in the organisational world. Currently, organisations need to differentiate themselves, and one of their biggest challenges is the search and retention of talent. One of the factors that have been associated with attracting talent is employer branding. However, studies that explore the relationship between this, corporate reputation and the intention to apply for a job are scarce. As such, this study aims to analyse the mediating role of corporate reputation in the relationship between employer branding and the intention to apply for a job offer.

To achieve the goals, data were collected from 225 Portuguese adults. The response rate was 75%. Based on a survey, respondents reported their perceptions of employer branding of a specific organisation, and they rated the organisation’s reputation and their intention to apply to that organisation.

The results showed that employer branding (interest value; social value; economic value; development value; application value) positively influenced an organisation’s corporate reputation, which, in turn, increased an individual’s intention to apply for an employment offer in that organisation.

The present study is a contribution to the literature on employer branding, as it reinforced the importance that employer branding and corporate reputation play in the intention of applying for a job offer.