Charity organizations such as International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement, Amnesty International, and Greenpeace address some of the world’s most pressing challenges. Yet, they often operate with fewer resources, personnel, and marketing budgets than their profit-driven counterparts. This makes creativity, evidence-based thinking, and strategic communication essential: charities must find ways to generate awareness, attract new supporters, and sustain long-term engagement.

In this course, you will learn what drives people to care, give, and act for others. Drawing on cutting-edge behavioral research and the SHIFT framework, the course explores how social influence, habits, identity, emotions, and the tangibility of impact shape prosocial consumer behavior and charitable giving. Through interactive discussions, real-world campaign examples, guest speakers, and a hands-on research project, students will critically examine how charities and companies encourage prosocial action and design their own evidence-based interventions. 

By the end of the course, students will not only understand the psychology behind charitable behavior, but also how to apply these insights to real-world marketing challenges. Through a social marketing perspective, the course also highlights how behavioral insights and charitable engagement can contribute to addressing many of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.

By the end of this course, students will be able to…

• Explain key behavioral drivers of prosocial consumer behavior and charitable giving.
• Discuss differences between individual and corporate giving and critically assess ethical implications and stakeholder responsibilities in promoting prosocial behavior.
• Design evidence-based interventions and marketing strategies that encourage prosocial engagement and charitable giving
• Conduct a small-scale empirical research project in a team addressing a relevant practical challenge or academic question in charitable marketing.

Students are expected to attend 100% of the scheduled classes (formal records of attendance will be kept). You at least need to be present 80% of the time, which implies that you should not miss more than one session.

The course combines research-driven and practice-oriented learning to explore the psychological drivers of prosocial behavior and charitable giving. Students engage with cutting-edge research in charity marketing, with the SHIFT framework serving as a central organizing lens throughout the course.

Interactive sessions encourage students to critically discuss theories, analyze real-world campaigns, and develop solutions to practical challenges in charitable marketing. A project-based learning approach gives students ownership over designing and conducting their own small-scale empirical research project, while the instructor provides targeted guidance on theory, research design, and analytical methods.

To bridge theory and practice, guest speakers from nonprofit organizations and industry share first-hand insights into the opportunities and challenges of mobilizing prosocial action and engaging donors, volunteers, and consumers. 

The course assessment consists of three components:

1. Class participation and engagement (20%)
   Active participation in discussions, interactive exercises, and guest speaker sessions is expected throughout the course.
2. Charity Challenge Assignments (30%)
   Guest speakers from nonprofit and marketing organizations introduce real-world charitable marketing challenges faced by their organizations (e.g., attracting younger donors, increasing blood donations, encouraging long-term engagement, or improving campaign effectiveness). Students may opt into selected challenges and develop structured, theoretically grounded, and evidence-based solutions that apply concepts from the course. Proposed solutions are discussed and critically reflected upon in class together with the guest speakers.
3. Group Research Project (50%)
   Student teams conduct a small-scale empirical research project addressing a relevant question or challenge in charitable marketing. Projects are presented and discussed at the end of the course.

The following grading grid is applied:

• 90–100 points: excellent (1)
• 80–89 points: good (2)
• 70–79 points: satisfactory (3)
• 60–69 points: sufficient (4)
• 0–59 points: failed (5)

This course is part of the elective pool "Marketing for a Better World" of the MSc Marketing at WU.

MSc Marketing students can only register if they have successfully completed the following mandatory courses from the 1st year:

• Management by Experiments (5 ECTS)
• Marketing Analytics (7.5 ECTS)
• Digital Marketing (5 ECTS)

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If you have questions about the course content or organization, you are welcome to get in touch at any time. I am happy to answer questions directly after class or via email at pascal.guentuerkuen@wu.ac.at

Course Materials

All course materials will be made available via WU’s Canvas learning platform and the WU library.

UN Sustainable Development Goals Considered in the Course: 

The 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals ultimately depend on collective human behavior, resource mobilization, and public engagement. The course contributes to all of these goals by discussing means to use communication, behavioral insights, and stakeholder mobilization to encourage prosocial action and societal support. (SDG #1-17)

The Use of AI

The use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools such as Open AI’s ChatGPT, Google’s Gemini or Microsoft’s Co-Pilot for various aspects of this course is encouraged. However, students shall keep in mind that these tools are not fully reliable and often return false results presented with great “confidence”. 

In their submissions, students must declare if and how they have used AI for their coursework. Reflecting on students’ use of AI will be subject to class discussion and best practices will be shared. Useful, state-of-the-art AI tools for different applications can be found here: https://theresanaiforthat.com/