Conclusion

This study was aimed to gain insights into the influence of green marketing on individuals’

intention to use car sharing. Furthermore, it was studied whether there was an indirect effect of attitude towards car sharing on the relationship between advertising claim and the intention to use car sharing and whether the source of the advertisement moderated this indirect effect. The following research question had to be answered: To what extent do different advertising claims (environmental vs. financial) stimulate consumers’ intention to use car sharing, how does attitude explain this effect, and to what extent does the influence of the advertisement claim on the attitude depend on the source?

Firstly, hypothesis 1 stated that exposure to an advertising claim focused on the

environment instead of focused on financial leads to greater intentional use of car sharing. The finding showed no support for hypothesis 1 since advertising claims did not influence the intention to use car sharing. Although the intention to use car sharing was not statistically significantly different among the different advertising claims, there was a difference in mean of intention to use car sharing in favor of the advertising claim focused on financial. This

contradicts the findings of Ansar (2013), who has investigated how green marketing can

influence the purchase intention from consumers. He mentioned that green marketing could be a powerful tool to educate consumers by using green products and services to live a more

sustainable life and with that improve the environment. The research of Ansar (2013) analyzed the link between environmental advertisements and consumers intention to purchase green products. The study discovered that these variables were positively correlated. Isak and M. Zabil

(2012) confirmed the assumption of the central role of knowledge. Knowledge is necessary to change someone’s behavioral intention. The rational choice theory can support the results of the greater intentional use of car sharing of consumers exposed to an advertising claim focused on financial benefits. This theory states that consumers act in their own self-interest. Cost savings are in the individual's best interest, whereas environmental benefits are more for society as a whole. Consumers can therefore be more willing to use car sharing when they can directly benefit from it themselves.

The second hypothesis states that exposure to an advertising claim focused on the environment will lead to a more positive attitude towards car sharing than a financial focused advertising claim. This is in line with the explanation above concerning the rational choice theory and the relationship of advertising claim and intention since attitude is the step before developing intention. This is shown in the KAB model. This model assumes that consumers need enough knowledge and a positive attitude towards a product or service to change and influence their intentional behavior. The KAB model was recently tested in a research done by Shankar Iyer (2018), who investigated students’ usage of electronic waste. Shankar Iyer’s research showed that a rise in knowledge and awareness positively impacts students’ attitudes towards electronic waste, and the attitude will then positively influence the behavior. This proves again that without knowledge, you are nowhere. So, the priority for promoting car sharing is to increase the awareness level and knowledge of people about car sharing. This includes helping consumers understand the environment's problem and the positive impact car sharing can make.

This research showed that consumers’ attitude towards car sharing positively affects their intention to use car sharing. This is supported by the theory of planned behavior. This theory revealed the important role of attitude on intentional behavior. This is an interesting finding

knowing about the gap between attitude and intentional behavior. Marketers should look into the impact of factors such as the price and the amount of provided information. In general, green products and services are perceived as too expensive, and consumers are not convinced to go green due to a lack of information (Rahman et al., 2017). This argument was supported by one participant of the survey. The participant prefers car rental for a day because the individual assumes it is cheaper than car sharing. However, if car sharing would be cheaper this participant would like to make use of the service. Nonetheless, the third hypothesis, which stated that the effect of the advertising claim on intention to use car sharing is mediated by attitude towards car sharing, was rejected. This finding can be explained by the rational assumption that due to the low knowledge of car sharing; advertising claims cannot have an effect on consumers attitude towards car sharing. In addition, not enough knowledge can lead to no intention to use car sharing.

Lastly, it was assumed that the source of the advertisement would have an impact on the attitude towards car sharing. Previous literature showed the importance of source credibility. A credible source scores higher on believability by and acceptance of the consumer, which leads to a more positive attitude (Clark & Evans, 2014; Hovland et al., 1953; Pornpitakpan, 2004). This research shows a positive correlation between source credibility and intention, source credibility and attitude, and source credibility and familiarity. This means that higher source credibility leads to greater intentional use of car sharing, a more positive attitude towards car sharing, and more familiarity with car sharing. This all shows the importance of the high credibility of the source for the success in promoting car sharing. Hypothesis 4 assumes that an advertisement communicated by a public source has a stronger impact on consumers’ attitudes towards car sharing than when communicated by a private source. In this study, Rijksoverheid was chosen as

the public source and was expected to possess more credibility than Greenwheels, the private source in the study. In general, citizens in The Netherlands trust their government and often follow what the government says. Moreover, literature shows the importance of CSR in determining credibility. Consumers believe that corporations only use marketing out of self-interest. This makes consumers skeptical with the results of consumers questioning the credibility (Nalband & Kelabi, 2014; Punitha & Mohd Rasdi, 2013). Based on previously

mentioned research, private sources are often associated with selling something and therefore are perceived as less believable. This results in the expectation that advertisements communicated by private sources would have less impact on consumers’ attitudes towards car sharing. However, findings for attitude towards car sharing show no interaction effect of advertising claim and source of the advertisement. In other words, there was insufficient evidence to support the assumption that the source of the advertisement impacts the relationship between advertising claims and attitude towards car sharing. A reason for this could be that participants were mainly focused on the claim and not paying attention to the source. The source was illustrated small and in the right bottom corner, so it was not as visible as the claim which was presented at the top.

So, it could be that the source did not catch the attention of the participants. Besides that, it was assumed that Millennials knew the chosen sources. However, it is possible that some participants were not familiar with the sources. Due to these reasonings, the sources might have not played a big role in this experiment.