A social marketing approach to blood donor commitment: the role of personal norms and self-conscious emotions

Purpose Existing research on blood donation has predominantly focused on intention to donate rather than behaviour maintenance, with limited attention to the application of relationship marketing principles within a social marketing framework, to ensure donor retention. To advance the social marketing agenda on retention by borrowing relationship marketing concepts, this study frames blood donation as a relationship-maintenance problem and this study models commitment to continued donation as the focal outcome. This study aims to extend prior work by modelling how emotional (pride, guilt), cognitive (awareness of consequences) and normative (personal norms) constructs interact to sustain individuals’ commitment to blood donation behaviour, and whether these effects vary by donor frequency and donor career span. Design/methodology/approach A total of 658 active blood donors were surveyed across South Africa using purposive sampling to ensure respondent eligibility. Following ethical clearance, a pilot study was conducted before the online self-administered survey was distributed and completed by eligible respondents. Structural equation modelling and multigroup moderation analysis were conducted using IBM Amos 29.0 and SPSS 29.0, respectively, to test the proposed hypotheses. Findings Results indicate that personal norms, strengthened by feelings of pride and guilt, are central to commitment to continued donation. Moderation analysis shows that donors with longer donation careers experience greater pride in their donor identity, which in turn heightens their moral obligation to continue donating. Awareness of the consequences of blood donation also exerted a stronger influence on personal norms among long-tenure donors, highlighting the role of accumulated donor experience in sustaining commitment. Originality/value This study’s originality lies in reframing donor retention as a relationship-maintenance problem and operationalising commitment to continued donation as the focal outcome, thereby borrowing relationship marketing concepts into social marketing. By treating commitment, not one-off intention, as the behavioural endpoint, this study aligns donor retention with relationship marketing’s core mechanism for sustaining exchanges and future participation. The findings advance theoretical understanding by linking self-conscious emotions, personal norms and relationship marketing variables to donor retention. Practically, they offer a framework for social marketing practitioners and blood transfusion organisations to design targeted retention strategies such as personalised impact feedback, segmented emotional appeals and long-term engagement initiatives that can sustain donor commitment and contribute to the stability of national blood supplies.