We are not on the same page: The effects of salesperson trust overestimation on customer satisfaction and relationship performance

Abstract

While vast literature on trust expounds on its critical role in buyer-seller relationships, scholars have only recently begun exploring the impact of inaccurate perceptions of trust. These inaccurate perceptions matter because salespeople might prioritize their customers in ways that do not reflect customers' true profit potential. One serious inaccurate perception is salespeople's upwardly biased perception that their customers trust them more than they actually do, a concept we call salesperson trust overestimation. We develop a framework to explore the effects of salesperson trust overestimation on customer account revenue and word of mouth. We test our model using surveys from matched B2B salesperson-customer dyads and objective performance data. A 1-unit increase in salesperson trust overestimation decreases financial revenue by $7.89 million and potential referral revenue by $1.12 million, indicating severe negative consequences of trust overestimation. Moreover, the negative effects of trust overestimation are exacerbated by relationship intensity and mitigated by market dynamism. These findings have significant theoretical and managerial implications, suggesting limits to the effectiveness of long-term relationships and conditions in which market dynamism may aid in building relationships between salespeople and their customers.