Sustainability and Social Responsibility

Building Trust in the Consumer-Company Relationship: The Role of Consumer Perceptions of Transparency and Social Responsibility

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Abstract

Developing trust is a significant part of building the company-consumer relationship. Trust built between a company and its consumers contributes to generating positive marketing outcomes such as loyalty, customer retention, product choices, purchase intention, willingness to act, and overall market performance (e.g., Matzler, Grabner-Kräuter, & Bidmon, 2008). For this reason, being considered a trustworthy company by consumers is more critical than ever, this leads to the question of what it takes to build such trust between a company and its consumers (Knowles, 2003). Despite extensive studies on brand trust, most of which have focused more on the outcomes of trust (e.g., loyalty and repurchase) rather than its predictors, the question of what builds trust remains largely unanswered.

Keywords: social responsibility, Transparency, trust

How to Cite:

Kang, J. & Hustvedt, G., (2013) “Building Trust in the Consumer-Company Relationship: The Role of Consumer Perceptions of Transparency and Social Responsibility”, International Textile and Apparel Association Annual Conference Proceedings 70(1).