Sergio Román

The Impact of Ethical Sales Behaviour on Customer Satisfaction, Trust and Loyalty to the Company: An Empirical Study in the Financial Services Industry

The need to be customer-focused to the highly changing marketing environment has never been more important for financial services institutions. However, under the present circumstances, where customers are becoming more demanding and increasingly mobile between competing financial providers, being customer-oriented is not enough. Financial services companies, and more specifically, their contact employees (e.g. salespeople) need to be perceived as ethical by their customers. This research represents an initial step in analysing the role of ethical sales behaviour, as perceived by bank customers, in developing and maintaining relationships with customers. The findings revealed that a salesperson’s ethical behaviour leads to higher customer satisfaction, trust and loyalty to the bank that the salesperson represents. Managerial and research implications are also discussed.

Determinants and consequences of ethical behaviour: An empirical study of salespeople.

– The main purpose of this research is to gain a clearer understanding of several key determinants and consequences of the ethical behaviour of salespeople., – Questionnaires were administered during regularly scheduled meetings to a total of 280 financial services salespeople. The salespeople questioned were mainly specializing in selling high‐involvement financial products (e.g. mortgages, life insurance) to final consumers., – Results suggest that method of compensation and control system (CS) are important determinants of ethical behaviour. Age (AGE) also proves to be a significant antecedent of ethical behaviour. However, education (EDU) is not significantly related to ethical behaviour. Additionally, a salespersons ethical behaviour leads to lower levels of role conflict‐intersender and higher levels of job satisfaction, but not higher performance., – To improve generalization of the findings, future research should broaden the sample by including a variety of industries. Likewise, the use of longitudinal data could provide new insights into the antecedents and consequences of ethical behaviour of salespeople and in particular the relationship with performance. Continuing research is needed to further analyse the relationship between ethical behaviour and other relevant behaviours that may take place during the interaction with the customer (e.g. organisational citizenship behaviours and customer orientation)., – This research is, to our knowledge, the first study that simultaneously identifies and analyses several key antecedents and consequences of the ethical behaviour of salespeople., – This study adds to the literature by reducing the existing gap and showing companies insights into how to foster ethical sales behaviour and the positive consequences that this behaviour has on their salespeople.

The effects of sales training on sales force activity

This study examines the effects of sales training on sales force performance and customer orientation in the context of small and medium‐sized companies (SMEs). The results give empirical evidence of the importance of sales training investment as a means of increasing sales performance. However, more training investment does not imply higher levels of customer‐oriented selling. Yet, higher levels of salespeople performance and customer‐oriented selling are observed when specific training methods and content are implemented. Additionally, customer‐oriented selling positively influences sales force performance, and sales training seems to moderate the relationship between sales force performance and effectiveness. Managerial implications and applications are discussed, and suggestions for future research are presented.

Is the influence of privacy and security on online trust the same for all type of consumers

This article analyzes the relationships among online trust and two of its most important antecedents, namely privacy and security, and explains how consumers’ characteristics (gender, age, education and extraversion), moderate the influence of both privacy and security in online trust. This study expands previous literature by identifying the conditions under which perceived privacy and security are likely to have the greatest positive effects on consumer trust in the online retailer. Based on data from 398 online consumers, the results revealed that the influence of both privacy and security on online trust was stronger for male, younger, more educated, and less extraverted consumers. Implications for theory and management are discussed.

The Influence of the Compensation System and Personal Variables on a Salesperson's Effective Listening Behaviour

Effective listening is crucial for salespeople to succeed in todays personal selling environment, yet poor listening is still one of the most important factors contributing to a salespersons failure. Despite its importance, very little research has focused on effective listening in this context. This study proposes a model that explains the effective listening behaviour of salespeople in terms of their method of compensation, ability to use customer knowledge, intrinsic motivation, gender, education and experience. The findings suggest that the above factors, with the exception of experience, are significant determinants of effective listening in the sales environment. A discussion of theoretical and managerial implications is presented, and key areas for future research are suggested.

A comparative analysis of sales training in Europe

When negotiation parties belong to different cultures, training can either increase or decrease negotiation differences in order to decrease or increase, respectively, the likelihood of achieving successful sales encounters and long‐term relationships. This study analyses sales training implementation practices of 128 northern European (the UK, The Netherlands and Finland) and 160 southern European (Spain and Portugal) small and medium‐sized companies. The authors argue that these two groups of countries have different cultural characteristics, and hence, different sales training practices are expected. As a result, differences have been found in terms of the quantity and the cost of the training as well as the subsidisation of the training. Moreover, differences in terms of sales training methods seem to be greater than in training content. Additionally, the subsidisation of the training, as well as certain training methods, have different effects on salespeople performance in northern and southern European countries. The implications of the findings for international sales negotiations are discussed, and additional research is suggested.

The influence of sales force technology use on outcome performance

Purpose – This paper aims to examine whether and how sales technology (ST) use helps salespeople perform better through the modification of their customer-qualification skills and customer-oriented selling behaviors. Also, the moderating role of salespeople’s technology self-efficacy is analyzed. Technological advancements have become an integral part of the personal selling process, yet the relationship between salesperson’s technology use and salesperson performance remains primarily unsubstantiated. Design/methodology/approach – Data are collected from a diverse sample of 265 salespeople across different industries. Hypotheses are tested with structural equation modeling. Findings – The results indicate that a salesperson’s customer-qualification skills and customer-oriented selling fully mediate the effect of technology use on outcome performance. In addition, salespeople high in technology self-efficacy seem to get the most out of their technology use. More specifically, the influence of technology u...

The relationships among consumers' ethical ideology, risk aversion and ethically-based distrust of online retailers and the moderating role of consumers' need for personal interaction

Consumer distrust is only recently beginning to be perceived as an important e-commerce issue and, unlike online trust, the nature and role of distrust is much less established. This study examines the influence of two important consumer characteristics (ethical ideology and risk aversion) on consumer’s ethically-based distrust of online retailers. Also, the moderating role of consumer’s need for personal contact with sales staff is tested. Results from 409 online consumers confirm that both relativist-based ethical ideology and risk aversion are strongly and positively related to consumers’ distrust. Interestingly, our findings show that positive effects of relativism and risk aversion on consumer’s distrust are moderated by consumers’ need for personal interaction, which is more pronounced for those consumers with a high need for personal interaction with retail salespeople.

Does the hierarchical position of the buyer make a difference? The influence of perceived adaptive selling on customer satisfaction and loyalty in a business-to-business context

Purpose – The first purpose of this research is to analyze the influence of adaptive selling, as perceived by customers, on customer satisfaction – both with the salesperson and the company – and loyalty to the supplier. In addition, this study aims to examine to what extent the organizational position occupied by the buyer moderates the results obtained (i.e. satisfaction and loyalty) as a consequence of a salesperson’s adaptive selling behavior. Design/methodology/approach – Data obtained from a survey of organizational buyers from a wide range of industries are analyzed through structural equation modeling. Findings – Findings from the study indicate that perceived adaptive selling significantly increases satisfaction with the salesperson, satisfaction with the supplier and loyalty to the supplier while controlling for length of the buyer–seller relationship. In addition, these effects are stronger when the contact person at the buying company is the general manager as opposed to the purchasing manager...

Measuring e-service quality in the context of service sites

To deliver superior service quality, managers must first understand how consumers perceive and evaluate online customer service. This is especially the case for companies offering intangible products. Therefore, the objective of this research is to develop a scale to measure customer perceived service quality in the context of service sites (e.g. insurance, retail banking and travel). In addition, contrary to most of previous service quality studies, formative instead of reflective indicators are used to conceptualise e-service quality. Our findings, from two samples of 193 and 199 online consumers lead to a short easy-to-administer scale with two versions depending if the customer has not experienced a service failure (14 items) or he/she has experienced such failure (17 items). In the former case, functionality, information, reliability/fulfilment and privacy/security explain e-service quality. In the latter case, an additional dimension named - customer recovery is included. Results show a different pattern when the customer has any problem.