The Effect of Levels of Customer Orientation and Customer Satisfaction of Firms on Trust Formation: An Evaluation from Customer Perspective

Because of intensification of competitive pressure and increase of industrial change/transformation, firms aim both protecting the existing customers and gaining new ones through responding quickly to the actions of competitors. Strategic advantage indicators as trust, customer orientation and customer satisfaction plays a major role in gaining sustainable competitive advantage and evaluating the business success especially in the recent years. In this study, firstly, the effect of costumer orientation and customer satisfaction on trust to the firm is theoretically evaluated. Next, a research model was developed and tested. The data of this paper were gathered from 311 university students. The empirical findings of this study show that customer orientation directly influences the trust and customer orientation indirectly affects trust through customer satisfaction.