Building of Trust (Positive and Negative Factors)

Giffin (1967) defines that “a trusting behaviour occurs when a person:

·       Relies on another

·       Risks something of value and

·       Attempts to achieve a desired goal”.

Young and Wilkinson (1989) examine the role of trust in marketing channels, 

Anderson and Narus (1990) and Anderson and Weitz (1989) note that “trust is a crucial concept in industrial marketing settings”, 

Brierley (1994, p. 25 (2)) proposes “respect, open communication and trust” as the recipe for successful relationship marketing, 

Morgan and Hunt (1994, pp. 20-38) suggest “trust, commitments and promises”, 

Cowles (1996), Foreman (1997) and Blois (1999, pp. 197-215) underline too “the role of trust” in business-to-business relationships and how to develop trust in buyer-seller relationships, 

Hart, Christopher and Johnson (1999, pp. 20-22) provide a Framework to develop relationships of trust, 

Hawles (1994, p. 215, 45) describes the process of earning buyer’s trust and suggests that “demonstrating trustfulness, providing benevolent service and establishing credibility are fundamental attributes which industrial sales persons must demonstrate to potential customers” and states that “trust is a prerequisite for success in selling industrial goods”, 

while Hawles, Mast and Swan (1989) and Guenzi (2002, pp. 749-778) describe how buyers and sellers think about industrial sales representatives trustworthiness.

Morgan and Hunt (1994, pp. 22-23) define their “KMV model” (key mediating variable) of Relationship Marketing, “which focuses on one party in the relational exchange and that party’s relational commitment and trust”.

“Because we hypothesize that relationship commitment and trust are key constructs, we position them as mediating variables between five important antecedents (i.e. relationship termination costs, relationship benefits, shared values, communication, and opportunistic behaviour) and five outcomes (i.e. acquiescence, propensity to leave, cooperation, functional conflict, and decision making uncertainty).”

Peppers and Rogers (2004, pp. 35-86) similarly note that to generate and sustain the trust of their customers companies have “to reconcile their own culture and behaviour” and that trust includes shared values, interdependence, quality communication, non opportunistic behaviour, integrity and expertise. 

They propose Charles Green (President of Trusted Advisors Associates) Trust Equation as a tool for identifying Trust influencing factors as:

Trust = (C+R+I)/S

Where C stands for Credibility (believability, trustfulness) related with Words, R for Reliability (predictability, familiarity) related with Actions, I for Intimacy (security, integrity) related with Safety as Positive Factors on Building Trust, while S for Self Orientation (selfishness, self consciousness, sell preoccupation) related with Focus as a Negative Factor, characterizing Credibility and Reliability as Rational and Intimacy and Self Orientation as Non Rational factors.

Michaels and Day (1985, pp. 443-446) propose the Customer Orientation of the Sales People, especially with Industrial Buyers, 

Besu, Ennew and Palmer (1998, pp. 170-175) suggest Expertise, Ethics and Customer Orientation as the Positive dimensions of a Sales person to build Customer’s Trust and Sales Orientation as the Negative dimension, while also consider Trust as a Positive among others requirement leading to Customer’s Satisfaction, 

while Swan, Trawick and Silva (1985, pp. 203-211) focus on Industrial Sales People approach towards gaining the Customer’s Trust.