Abstract
Marketers want to encourage constituents to strongly identify with their organizations, because organizational identification contributes to positive firm outcomes. However, the extant research on organizational identity largely has overlooked the fact that an individual’s “self” actually is a collection of multiple social identities. This study is the first to propose and empirically demonstrate that marketers can leverage customers’ multiple societal roles (e.g., parent, environmentalist, professor) to build and reinforce their relationships with the firm. Specifically, the research introduces the concept of “identity synergy.” Identity synergy occurs when individuals’ involvement with an organization facilitates their pursuit of other important social identities. Our study shows that customer perception of identity synergy is positively related to identification with an organization. Moreover, the study helps explain the process by which antecedents of organizational identity (identity affirmation, identity support, and value congruence) positively affect customer-firm relationships by proposing and testing identity synergy as a mediator between these antecedents and organizational identification. The study also contributes to our understanding of organizational identity theory by introducing the new concept of peer identification, or identification with other members of the organization, such as other customers or volunteers. The empirical evidence demonstrates identity synergy’s role in building peer identification, as well as peer identification’s role in building organizational identification.
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Notes
To ensure that no bias was created in the structural paths emanating from the synergy construct due to the fact that the constitutive “identity” terms making up the multiplicative measure of synergy were not hypothesized or estimated in the model, we ran regression analyses, including the constitutive terms and the synergy term as predictors of organizational identification and peer identification. For both dependent variables, when the “identity” direct effects were included without the interaction term, all three constitutive terms had significant effects. However, when the multiplicative synergy term was included, the constitutive terms all became insignificant, providing confirmation that the results of the hypotheses tested in the structural model were not biased by not including the constitutive terms.
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Acknowledgments
The authors would like to thank Jennifer Hall, Harry Jones, and Jim Brewer from the Phoenix Zoo for their hard work in making this project possible; Bruce Clark from Northeastern University for his insightful comments and timely advice throughout the review process; and the editor and anonymous reviewers for their insightful feedback on earlier drafts of this manuscript. The authors also gratefully acknowledge the financial support of the Center for Services Leadership at Arizona State University.
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Appendices
Appendix A
Constructs (Scale Sources) | Items | Item Loadings |
|---|---|---|
Support (Adapted from Eisenberger et al. 1990)a | ||
The[organization] cares about my well-being as a/an _____________. | .96 | |
The[organization] cares about my opinions as a/an _____________. | .96 | |
The[organization] is willing to help me in my role as a/an ____________. | .97 | |
The[organization] considers my goals and values as a/an _____________. | .97 | |
Value Congruence (Adapted from Maxham and Netemyer 2003)a | ||
The[organization] has the same values as I do with regard to _____________. | n/a | |
Affirmation (Adapted from Drigotas et al. 1999)a | ||
The[organization] sees me as a good ____________. | .99 | |
The[organization] thinks I have the traits and dispositions of a good ____________. | .99 | |
The[organization] treats me like I am a good ____________. | .97 | |
Synergy (Adapted from Carlson et al. 2006)a | ||
Being a member of the[organization] makes it easier for me to be a good __________. | .96 | |
Being a member of the[organization] makes it easier to fulfill my duties/responsibilities as a/an ________. | .96 | |
Being a member of the[organization] gives me the opportunity to be a better ___________. | .95 | |
Being a member of the[organization] has positively affected my role as a/an ___________. | .95 | |
Organizational Identity (Ashforth and Mael 1989) | ||
When someone criticizes the [organization], it feels like a personal insult. | .86 | |
I am very interested in what others think about the [organization]. | .81 | |
When I talk about the [organization], I usually say ‘we’ rather than ‘they.’ | .84 | |
The [organization]’s successes are my successes. | .90 | |
When someone praises the[organization] it feels like a personal compliment. | .92 | |
Member Identity (Ashforth and Mael 1989) | ||
When someone criticizes other members of the [organization], it feels like a personal insult. | .92 | |
I am very interested in what others think about other members of the[organization]. | .89 | |
When I talk about other members of the [organization], I usually say ‘we’ rather than ‘they.’ | .90 | |
The members’ successes are my successes. | .94 | |
When someone praises other members of the [organization] it feels like a personal compliment. | .95 | |
Appendix B: Customer Social Identities
Zoo Member Identities | Representative Quotes from Exploratory Interviews |
|---|---|
1. Animal Lover | • “I love the animals. They’re life. They’re like a therapy to me.” |
• “We are definitely animal lovers. We have a soft spot for them. It’s fun to watch them play and be babies.” | |
2. Community Member | • “I like supporting the zoo because it is privately owned. It deserves community support. I buy more of a membership than I need. I don’t go that often, but if I can help keep admission costs down so others can go, I feel like I am helping the community.” |
• “The community needs things like the zoo and like libraries, and we need to instill that in our youth.” | |
3. Conservationist | • “The zoo has some major conservation projects that we like to support with our membership.” |
• “I joined the zoo partly to support their conservation efforts.” | |
4. Employee/Boss | • “The zoo has many great events that are great for me to bring my important clients to.” |
• “My husband finds his consulting job melds with our zoo membership very well. [Company X] is his client—and [Company X] supports the zoo as well. So they both attend many of the social events, which turns into great face time with a valuable client.” | |
5. Exerciser/Walker | • “Well, it’s a nice place to go for a walk for exercise. Even if you’re not an animal lover, it’s still nice place to come for a walk.” |
• “It’s a place for me to get some exercise.” | |
6. Family Member | • “I have seven kids. Our oldest is 25 and our youngest is 3. With our family, especially with our spread in age, it is difficult to find something everyone can enjoy.” |
• “My kids love the zoo and it keeps them happy. It is a family event.” | |
7. Friend | • “I upgraded my membership level at the zoo so I could take friends.” |
• “My membership comes with free guest passes, which I use to bring friends with me so I don’t go to the zoo alone.” | |
8. Grandparent | • “We enjoy bringing the grandkids here and everything.” |
• “I don’t really ever go, unless I bring my grandkids.” | |
9. Outdoor Person | • “We appreciate the outdoors, and we try to take care of it.” |
• “I am part of a realm of people that enjoy nature, wildlife, and just being outdoors.” | |
10. Parent | • “It absolutely makes me feel like a good father to bring her to the zoo.” |
• “Being a zoo member affirms that I can do my job as a parent. I can keep my kids happy. I can entertain them and I can educate them all at once, which is pretty gosh darn hard.” | |
11. Religious Person | • “I like to come to the zoo to listen to God—by observing his creation at the zoo, I try to find out who God is.” |
• “I have some deep meditations here that I can’t get anywhere else. This is where you get in touch with all of the world, in a sense. It has a lot deeper value and meaning to me.” | |
12. Shopper | • “I love to shop, and the zoo often has some great gift ideas for both friends and family.” |
• “I buy my children’s families memberships to the zoo every year for Christmas. It is really a great gift idea.” | |
13. Social Person | • “We know other families that have memberships. We have combined our time so we can all go together.” |
• “Yeah, we have quite a big group of people in that area that actually have zoo passes, and we go quite often in groups.” | |
14. Spouse | • “My husband and I often go to the zoo together just because we’re home and need something to do together.” |
• “It was a cool date thing. We were married 9 years before we had kids. You can only sit and watch the sun set so many times.” | |
15. Teacher/Academic | • “As a teacher, the zoo has many great programs for me to bring my students to.” |
• “My friend, who home schools her children, takes her kids all the time (to the zoo). For her, learning is a top priority.” | |
16. Volunteer | • “The zoo has volunteer opportunities. Volunteer opportunities help me feel involved and that I can make a difference.” |
• “As a docent, I can interact with many of the visitors and talk about the animals which I love so dearly.” |
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Fombelle, P.W., Jarvis, C.B., Ward, J. et al. Leveraging customers’ multiple identities: identity synergy as a driver of organizational identification. J. of the Acad. Mark. Sci. 40, 587–604 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11747-011-0254-5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11747-011-0254-5