Enhancing corporate social responsibility through market orientation practices in bottom of pyramid markets: with special reference to microcredit institutions

Abstract

Market-oriented organizations are committed to understanding and serving customer needs. Customers become socially conscious, so market-oriented firms need to carry out ‘Corporate Social Responsibility’ (CSR) initiatives. The main aim of this study was to investigate the influence of market orientation on CSR among microcredit institutions. The findings of this study are useful for microcredit institutions and marketers operating in bottom of pyramid (BOP) market to enhance their CSR through market orientation practices. The sample comprised 250 managers of microcredit institutions operating in the rural areas of Sri Lanka. The surveys were administered for data collection. All the three components of market orientation, that is, customer orientation, competitor orientation, and inter-functional coordination significantly and positively influenced the CSR involvement. Adaptation to BOP Market Culture enhanced the positive influences of both customer orientation and inter-functional coordination, on CSR. From these findings, implications for theory and practice have been discussed.