Customer Orientation of the Salesperson

What it measures

A four-item scale measuring the extent to which a customer perceives their salesperson as being genuinely oriented toward understanding and satisfying customer needs rather than simply making a sale. Items assess need-eliciting behaviour, customer-best-interest orientation, solution provision, and need-satisfying product recommendations. Grounded in the SOCO (Selling Orientation-Customer Orientation) tradition, the scale captures dyadic perceptions of salesperson customer focus from the buyer's perspective.

Response format

7-point Likert

Scale items

• The salesperson tried to find out my needs.
• The salesperson had my best interests in mind.
• The salesperson tried to offer me solutions for my needs.
• The salesperson offered me products that satisfied my needs.

Full scale items shown. Always cite the original source when using this scale in research.

Usage notes & scoring

Single alpha: α = .92 — Ryari, Alavi & Wieseke (2021; customer data from 291 dyadic interactions in a retail furniture chain). VALIDITY: CFA confirmed adequate model fit and convergent and discriminant validity across all multi-item measures in the study. Adapted from the SOCO scale (Saxe & Weitz 1982) and related customer orientation measures; items were selected and rephrased to capture the customer's perception of salesperson behaviour in a brief format appropriate for dyadic field data collection.

Recommended companion scales

Citation

Ryari, Hanane, Sascha Alavi, and Jan Wieseke (2021). Selling to active customers: The benefits and challenges of customer engagement initiation in personal selling. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 49(2), 214–234.

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