| China’s internet philanthropy has made considerable progress.However,the level of internet-based charitable fundraising in China still lags behind,and there is significant difference among the outcomes of online fundraising campaigns,which implies that the potential of charitable organizations’ online fundraising needs to be further tapped.The mechanism on how charitable organizations operating internet-based fundraising has not been definitely concluded in extant literature.And there is also a lack of conceptualization on charitable organizations’ internet-based charitable fundraising behaviors as well as strategic suggestions for charitable organizations to deal with the challenges brought by internet-based charitable fundraising.Based on Signaling Theory,this dissertation conducted a research on the internet-based charitable fundraising by using the Mixed Methods approach.The main findings and conclusions of this dissertation are as follows:First,the dissertation structured a theoretical analysis framework of signaling.The problem of information asymmetry also exists in the field of online charitable fundraising,hence it’s reasonable to interpret it with Signaling Theory.As signaler,charitable organizations can transmit quality signals to(potential)donors who are the signal receivers,which may influence their donation decisions.Fundraising practices shows that the use of information and communication media by charitable organizations and the feedback behaviors of donors except donation may also have an impact on donors’ donation decisions.Therefore,based on the classic signaling model,this dissertation added signaling path and feedback signal into the theoretical analysis framework of signaling for online fundraising.Second,the dissertation verified the explanatory power of the theoretical analysis framework of signaling.Based on the theoretical analysis framework of signaling,this dissertation put forward several hypotheses in three dimensions,namely the direct effects of signals,the moderating effect of signaling path,and the mediating effect of feedback signals,and used SPSS software to quantitatively analyze the actual platform fundraising project data.The analysis results confirmed that the signals transmitted by charitable organizations,the signal transmission paths it used,and the feedback signals transmitted by donors have significant impacts on the online fundraising performance,and the feedback signals of donors exerts mediating/suppression effect on the signals and signaling paths.Third,the dissertation provided strategic suggestions for charitable organizations.This research discussed the results of the empirical analysis,and accordingly provided strategic suggestions for charitable organizations to carry out online charitable public fundraising campaigns.In order to improve the fundraising performance,charitable organizations shall highlight signals(such as the past experience,organizational cooperation,project updates,and low management costs,etc.)that can reflect the organization’s and project’s quality when designing of the fundraising campaign,and try to design "small(scale)but beautiful(project design)" fundraising projects.charitable organizations shall also use social media platforms and other signal transmission channels to improve the observability and coverage of the signals,and provide donors with more channels and forms to transmit feedback signals.Fourth,the dissertation explained the suppression effect of the feedback signal on the organization’s cooperation signal.The result of the quantitative analysis found that the feedback signal plays a suppression effect on the organization’s cooperation signal.the plausible explanation is that organizational cooperation signal has two sides to reflect the quality of fundraising projects.Different organizational cooperation models do not necessarily improve the quality of fundraising projects in the same way,and feedback signals will amplify the negative effect of organizational cooperation signal.The two signals conflict with each other while reflecting the quality of fundraising projects,so donors may therefore question the quality of charitable organizations.Based on this explanation,the research further divided the organizational cooperation modes into four types: Qualification Sharing,Support and Empowerment,Topic Collaboration,and Branding Cooperation,and analyzed the different impacts of the four types of cooperation modes on the quality of fundraising projects.Fifth,the dissertation offered theoretical response to the three main issues of Internet philanthropy based on the analysis framework of signaling.First,the theoretical analysis framework of signaling emphasizes signals,signal transmission channels and feedback signals,which raise higher requirements for the capabilities of charitable organizations,but also provides a strategic direction for the charitable organizations’ capacity building.For better signaling,charitable organizations need to improve its quality through capacity building.Second,the theoretical analysis framework of signaling reveals that the internet fundraising platform constitutes the signaling environment.In order to strengthen the effect of signaling between charitable organizations and donors,the platforms need to improve its functions in three aspects:displaying signals,transmitting signals,and promoting feedback signals from donors.Third,in response to the trust issues in Internet philanthropy mentioned by several scholars,charitable organizations can rely on the theoretical analysis framework of signaling,building connection through signaling paths,establishing relationships with donors with signals,and strengthening the relationship with feedback signals,which may lead to the formation and maintenance of trust in internet philanthropy.Based on the findings and conclusions above,this research may have the following contributions.First,it proposed theoretical analysis framework of signaling for internetbased charitable fundraising,and verified its explanatory power by analyzing the influencing factors of fundraising performance with it.Second,it added the signaling paths and feedback signals into the signaling theory,which may further expand its application in the research fields related to internet.Thirdly,it proposed threedimensional strategic guidance for charitable organizations on signals,signaling paths and feedback signals.Fourth,it classified four types of organizational collaboration modes in the internet-based fundraising industry. |
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