Cause-Related Videos to Sensitize Spanish-Speaking Netizens: Analysis of International Offline and Online Word-of-Mouth

Awareness campaigns run by commercial brands aligned with social causes generate both offline and online word-of-mouth. This research compares users' intentions to word-of-mouth about cause-related marketing campaigns, both in person and digitally, across global contexts. Likewise, the moderating role of prior familiarity with the allied social cause and the commercial brand is examined in offline and online word-of-mouth. A quasi-experimental study is proposed on a sample of 1029 international Spanish-speaking individuals who evaluate their intentions to comment: about the cause (i) offline and (ii) online; and about the brand (iii) offline and (iv) online. Different means comparison tests and analysis of variance confirm greater intentions to WOM and eWOM about the cause and the brand offline. They also corroborate the moderating role of brand and cause familiarity. Moreover, a certain degree of joint interaction between cause and brand familiarity intensifies the intention to word-of-mouth about the cause, both offline and online, rather than about the brand.