The observed thickness dependence and excitation profiles of the surface-enhanced resonance Raman scattering (SERRS) from crystal violet (CV) on silver films demonstrated the importance of surface roughness and chemical effects. Using different normalization schemes in studying the excitation profile of SERRS we were able to identify that there are three multiplicative contributions to the observed overall enhancement, viz. the electromagnetic effect, the molecular resonance effect and the charge-transfer effect originating from the strong electronic interactions between CV and the metal islands.