• The Research Journal of the Costume Culture
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• v.11 no.6
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• pp.793-807
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• 2003

The purpose of this study is to show the component and anticipation factors of loyalty and word-of-mouth. Specifically, hypothesis is that trust in a salesperson will influence satisfaction with the salesperson, and the store. And the satisfactions with the salesperson and the store will influence the loyalty to the salesperson and the store. Another hypothesis is that loyalty to a salesperson and a store will influence word-of-mouth. Scale items used in this study were selected from developed scales and were adapted to conforming to the selling situation in the service setting. Factor analysis and Cronbach's alpha test were accomplished. A total of 703 samples was used to test the hypotheses. The primary method of statistical analysis to test the hypotheses was a structural equation modeling on LISREL 8.3. The results of the study are as follows: First, trust had an influence on satisfaction with a salesperson and a store. Second, the results suggested that satisfaction with the salesperson and the store influences loyalty to the salesperson and the store. Finally, loyalty to the salesperson and the store influenced word-of-mouth, as predicted.

• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.16 no.11
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• pp.57-64
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• 2018

Purpose - As the importance of salesperson attitudes and behaviors enhancing customer perception and loyalty have increased, many retail companies put emphasis on internal marketing activities. The issue also has captured the interest of academics, but most of the previous research tends to be limited to investigating antecedents of salesperson job satisfaction and commitment. Based on the consumer-brand relationship concepts, this study aims to examine the effects of the salesperson-brand relationships on customers' service evaluation and store loyalty. Research design, data, and methodology - In a structural equation model, it is hypothesized that salesperson brand identification influences salespersons' brand trust and affect, which are the two dimensions of consumer-brand relationships. Salespersons' brand trust and affect are expected to increase salespersons' customer orientation, which in turn influences customers' service evaluations and store loyalty. To test this hypotheses a set of data collected from department stores in Seoul is utilized. Results - First, it was found that salesperson brand identification is a significant antecedent to salespersons' brand trust and affects, the two dimensions of salesperson brand relationships. Second, salespersons' brand trust and affect were found to enhance salespersons' customer-oriented behaviors. Third, salespersons' customer orientation showed a significant effect on customers' service evaluation. When a salesperson makes more effort to provide useful information for fulfilling customer needs, customers evaluate the salesperson's service more positively. Finally, customers' service evaluation had a positive impact on customers' store loyalty. Conclusions - This study provides significant academic and practical implications. First, based on the theory of consumer-brand relationships, the concept of salesperson-brand relationships was introduced and found to be an effective motivator of salespersons' customer oriented attitudes and behaviors. Therefore, the two dimensions of brand relationships, brand trust and affect, should be considered as the critical factors both in developing theoretical research and improving long-term company performance. Also, internal marketing activities should focus on maximizing employees' brand identification. That is, retail companies need to put emphasis on sharing their brand values and personality with internal customers to strengthen the brand relationships with salespersons and to enhance customer responses.

• Journal of Distribution Research
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• v.16 no.3
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• pp.77-104
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• 2011

As business marketers placed greater emphasis on building long-term relationships, trust has assumed a central role in the development of marketing theory(Dwyer, Schurr, and Oh 1987; Mogan and Hung 1994) and practice(Dertouzos, Lester, and Solow 1989). Marketing research on trust primarily focuses on two targets of trust: supplier firms and their salesperson. Trust of firm and trust of salesperson, though related, represent different concepts(Doney and Cannon 1997). Also, the definition of trust proposed by Ganesan(1994) reflects two distinct components: (1) credibility, which is based on the extent to which the buyer believes that the seller has the required expertise to perform the job effectively and reliably and (2) benevolence, which is based on the extent to which the buyer believes that the seller has intentions and motives beneficial to the buyer when new conditions arise, conditions for which a commitment was not made. The existing marketing research focuses on how trust of a firm and its salesperson has a differential effects on loyalty. However, these extant research pays little attention to the moderating effects that explicitly examine how two trust dimensions of salesperson(credibility and benevolence) affects loyalty of firm. The purpose of this study is to provide new insight into boundary conditions(individualism and industry type) that credibility and benevolence influences loyalty.

• Asia Marketing Journal
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• v.11 no.3
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• pp.31-56
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• 2009

As the competition intensifies and the market matures, marketers are more and more concerned with the relationship marketing. Many of the previous researches have pointed out that not all of the consumers are relationship-oriented. But none of the previous research has systematically investigated this issue. This research investigated the relationship among the three concepts: consumers' intrinsic characteristics, perceived importance of relational benefits, and relationship building intention with the salesperson. In this research the perceived importance of relational benefits is treated as mediating variable in the relationship between consumers' intrinsic characteristics and relationship building intention with the salesperson. The conceptual model in this study can be depicted as follows. From the consumers' perspective relational benefits can be defined as "the additional benefits consumers can receive in addition to core services through the long-term relationship with the service provider." And in this study two kinds of relational benefits are adopted by reviewing the previous research: confidence benefits and social benefits. Relational benefit received from the salesperson is very important to predict consumers' relationship building intention with the salesperson. The more relational benefits consumer wants from the salesperson, the more relationship building intention he/she has. From this point two hypotheses are derived as follows. Hypothesis 1: As the perceived importance of confidence benefit from the salesperson increases, the relationship building intention with the salesperson increases. Hypothesis 2: As the perceived importance of social benefit from the salesperson increases, the relationship building intention with the salesperson increases. In this study four individual characteristics(risk taking tendency, variety-seeking tendency, product knowledge, trust orientation) are hypothesized to influence the perceived importance of confidence benefits from the salesperson. And three individual characteristics(interpersonal orientation, price consciousness, trust orientation) are hypothesized to influence the perceived importance of social benefits from the salesperson. These 7 hypotheses are as follows. Hypothesis 3: As the risk taking tendency increases, the perceived importance of confidence benefits from the salesperson decreases. Hypothesis 4: As the variety-seeking tendency increases, the perceived importance of confidence benefits from the salesperson decreases. Hypothesis 5: As the product knowledge increases, the perceived importance of confidence benefits from the salesperson decreases. Hypothesis 6: As the trust orientation increases, the perceived importance of confidence benefits from the salesperson increases. Hypothesis 7: As the interpersonal orientation increases, the perceived importance of social benefits from the salesperson increases. Hypothesis 8: As the price consciousness increases, the perceived importance of social benefits from the salesperson decreases. Hypothesis 9: As the trust orientation increases, the perceived importance of social benefits from the salesperson increases. The whole model in this study can be depicted as follows: Data were collected from the 396 consumers who actually trade stocks through the salesperson and were analyzed using structural equation model. The analysis results show that consumers' perceived importance of relational benefits(confidence benefit and social benefit) play the roles of mediating variables in the causal relationship between consumers' inherent characteristics and their relationship building intention with the salesperson. As for the individual characteristics, the influences of variety-seeking tendency, trust orientation, and price consciousness are statistically significant. It was found that variety-seeking tendency has a significant negative effect on the perceived importance of confidence benefit, and that trust orientation has a significant positive effect on the perceived importance of both of confidence and social benefit. Finally it was also found that, on the contrary to the influence direction suggested in the hypothesis, price consciousness has a significant positive effect on the perceived importance of social benefit.

• Journal of Distribution Research
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• v.9 no.2
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• pp.75-99
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• 2004

The primary purpose of this research is to develop and test a model that explains the process of how trust in a supplier firm and salesperson through relational commitment influence buyer's positive and desirable behavior. In order to do so, we are empirically to examine how a supplier firm and salesperson trust can reinforce buyer's relational commitment leading to relational citizenship behavior using over 138 buying firms, Through structural equation modeling, we find that trust in a supplier firm and salesperson influence the relational commitment and relational commitment enhance relational citizenship behavior. However, trust in a supplier firm is unrelated to the buying firm's relational citizenship behavior whereas trust in salesperson has direct effect on relational citizenship behavior. Finally, we discuss several theoretical and practical implications, and suggest limitations for the research and future research issue.

• Journal of Global Scholars of Marketing Science
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• v.18 no.1
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• pp.1-31
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• 2008

Trust is central to human relationships, at all times and places. The importance of trust is fundamental in all areas of human life, not only in the area of business administration. 2,500 years ago in China, Confucius taught that the foundation of politics was the trust of the people, more important even than military strength or the supply of food. Shakespeare's play, "Much Ado about Nothing' is about trust and deception. These days, trust and transparency in a commercial organization's business culture form the basis of the 'social capital' by which that organization increases its productivity. A successful company raises productivity by the accumulation of social capital, derived from a trust relationship between business partners, and between the company and consumers. Trust is the crucial factor. At the national level, building trust determines a nation's competitiveness. For a company, long term trust relationships with customers are essential for its survival in a business environment of rapid change. Such relationships, based on trust, are important assets to ensure a company's competitive advantage, and need to be organic to that company's business culture. Because of this importance, trust relationships have been studied in diverse areas within business administration, and especially within marketing, where they form the basis of a successful relationship between producer and consumer. However, what has been lacking is a unified definition of trust. Research has been conducted on the basis of various definitions and models. The majority of researchers have not considered the multidimensional character of the concept of trust until now. Approaches based on a one dimensional model have undermined the value of research results. Furthermore, researchers have only considered trust and trustworthiness as a single component. The majority of research has explored the consequences of perceived trust for outcomes such as loyalty or cooperation, but has neglected the effects of trustworthiness upon the mechanisms of consumer trust. This study focuses on the dimension of trust from such a perspective. It seeks to verify the effect of trust on customer intentions by breaking it down into three separate components: 1) the salesperson, 2) the product/service, and 3) the company. The purposes of this paper are as follows: Firstly, we review the multidimensional nature of trust objects: the salesperson, the product/service, and the company. Secondly, we analyze the relationship between multidimensional trust and trustworthiness. Thirdly, we analyze the connection between trust and repeat purchase intentions for the maintenance of long term relationships. For these purposes the author has developed several hypotheses as follows: H1-1: The competence of a salesperson is positively associated with the trust given by the consumer to the salesperson. H1-2: The benevolence of a salesperson is positively associated with the trust given by the consumer to the salesperson. H2-1: The competence of product/service is positively associated with the trust given by the consumer to the product/service. H2-2: The benevolence of product/service is positively associated with the trust given by the consumer to the product/service. H3-1: The reputation of a company is positively associated with the trust given by the consumer to the company. H3-2: The physical environment of a company is positively associated with the trust given by the consumer to the company. H4-1: Trust in a salesperson is positively associated with repeat purchase intentions. H4-2: Trust in a product/service is positively associated with repeat purchase intentions. H4-3: Trust in a company is positively associated with repeat purchase intentions. The data was compiled from 366 questionnaires. 500 questionnaires were collected, but some of the data was considered unsuitable and inappropriate. The subjects of the survey were male and female customers purchasing products at department stores in Seoul, Daegu and Gyeongbuk. It was carried out between Oct. 25 and 29, 2007. The data was analyzed by frequency analysis using SPSS 12.0 and structural equation modeling using LISREL 8.7. The result of the overall model analysis is as follows: Chi-Square=445.497, d.f.=185, p-value=0.0, GFI=.901, RMSEA=.0617, NNFI=.986, NFI=.981, CFI=.989, AGFI=.864, RMR=.0872. The results of the overall model analysis were coherent. It was found that trust is a multi-dimensional construct, that each of the dimensions of trust are meaningful influences on customer's repurchase intention. Trust in a company may be the most relevant, while trust in a product/service and a salesperson may be less relevant to repurchase intentions. The effective factors in determining trust in a salesperson and a company's product/service were found to be competence and benevolence. Factors in determining trust in a company were its reputation and physical environment, and the relationship of each effective trust factor has been verified in this research. As a result, it was found that competence and benevolence have a meaningful influence on trust in a salesperson and in product/service. It was also found that a company's reputation influences the overall trust in the company significantly but a company's physical environment does not have much effect.

• Journal of Global Scholars of Marketing Science
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• v.11
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• pp.21-41
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• 2003

This study verified how the salesperson's efforts have an effect upon the result and the self-effect, the competitive mind, the role accuracy, supervisory trust in the important factors that effect the salesperson's efforts. After making up a questionary centering around the large distribution company and analyzing 218 copies, the result are as follows; First, salesperson's working hard has an affirmative effect upon the performance in the salesperson's efforts. Second, the self-effect, the competitive mind, supervisory trust have an affirmative effect in the working hard, and self-effect, supervisory trust have an affirmative effect in the working hard. But the role accuracy has a negative effect. Third, the self-effect, the competitive mind, the role accuracy, and the supervisory trust in the salesperson's performance are ineffectual. But, in the general effect, the self-effect has an affirmative effect and the role accuracy has a negative effect. The individuality and the supervisory trust don't have an effect upon the performance but the effect can rise through the salesperson's efforts, Therefore company should give salespersons the chance they can work hard, and would provide them the concrete aim rather than say to work hard only.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business
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• v.14 no.4
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• pp.1-21
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• 2023

Purpose - The study investigates the role of authenticity of B2B salespersons has on their consultative selling competence. The study also examines the mediating effect of customer orientation between the authenticity of B2B salespersons and their consultative selling competence, as well as the moderating role of trust in the buyer-seller exchange. Design/methodology/approach - This research utilized a covariance-based structural equation model technique. The study assessed the research model's moderation effects through a stepwise approach, which allowed for an examination of the moderating effect of trust in the buyer-seller relationship. Findings - As a result of structural equation analysis, this study found that the authenticity of B2B salespersons influences their consultative selling competence by mediating their customer orientation significantly. In addition, trust in the buyer-seller exchange plays a significant role as a moderating variable between customer orientation and competitive selling competence, but it is not significant as a moderating variable between the authenticity and customer orientation of B2B salespersons. Research implications or Originality - This research proposed the role of authenticity of the B2B salesperson as a key factor in the trust-based relationship and a key variable of consultative selling competence. The study has taken the research on the authenticity of the B2B salesperson one step further from the study of authenticity of the brand and the company's leadership.

• Journal of Distribution Research
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• v.9 no.3
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• pp.97-118
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• 2004

The primary purpose of this research is to develop and test a model that explains the process of how multidimensional trust in a supplier firm and salesperson through relational commitment influence buyer's relational citizenship behavior. The proposed framework uses a multidimensional conceptualization for the trustworthiness construct such as benevolence and credibility and incorporates two distinct facets of consumer trust, namely, organization trust, and salesperson trust. The authors test the proposed model using data from MD in buying finns.. The tests show the differential effect of trust dimensions on relational commitment and citizenship behavior. The authors discuss the implications of the findings for trust-commitment theory and practice.

• Journal of Fashion Business
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• v.8 no.3
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• pp.34-48
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• 2004

This study aims to determine any possible causation between identifying which major factors affect CRM(Customer Relationship Management) in terms of promotion strategies for fashion goods and classifying customers into several categories, so that it can seek reasonable strategic measures based on CRM. This study suggested a model by selecting several variables meeting its goals, and used total 672 sheets of questionnaire for final analysis. In addition, a structural equation model was analyzed As a result, it was found that pricing flexibility had more or less influential relationships with trust, satisfaction and commitment in CRM, although having a negative relationship with commitment. Salesperson's role was also significantly correlated with trust, satisfaction and commitment in CRM, and especially, there were more influential relationships with satisfaction than any other factor. Service quality had relatively high influential relationships with trust, satisfaction and commitment in CRM. Retained customers showed more or less influential relationships with trust, satisfaction and commitment, while loyal customers did so with satisfaction and commitment, except for trust.