Industrial Marketing Management 34 (2005) 263 – 273

Socializing behaviors in business-to-business selling: an exploratory study

from the Republic of Ireland
Susi Geiger a,*, Darach Turleyb,1
a
Department of Marketing, University College Dublin, Carysfort Avenue, Blackrock, Co Dublin, Ireland
b
Dublin City University Business School, Glasnevin, Dublin, Ireland

Received 16 February 2004; received in revised form 31 August 2004; accepted 25 September 2004
Available online 23 November 2004

Abstract

For many salespeople in business-to-business industries, client entertainment is an integral part of their daily duties. Despite this anecdotal
knowledge, few studies have so far attempted to examine the potential benefits and drawbacks of socializing with clients in a systematic
manner. Presenting the results of a qualitative investigation, this paper shows that when approached strategically, socializing with clients can
have positive effects on both the exchange as well as the relational aspects of the buyer–seller interaction. In particular, results indicate that
some elements of a close buyer–seller relationship are formed as a result of the holistic experience with the other person and may only be
established through interaction outside the office environment. The paper thus proposes that socializing strategies represent a unique tool in a
salesperson’s relationship selling toolkit—a tool that warrants increased attention in both sales practice and research.
D 2004 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Personal selling; Relationship selling; Qualitative research; Social relations; Client entertainment

1. Introduction and describe these activities in a manner that proves useful

In the last two decades, much effort has been devoted to
the issue of relationship selling (Dubinsky, Chonko, Jones,
& Roberts, 2003). One of the main findings in this stream of
research is that in long-term buyer–seller relationships,
economic exchange is complemented and often enhanced by
social exchange (Dwyer, Schurr, & Oh, 1987). Surprisingly,
despite the contention that social bonds are vital for a
continuing and mutually beneficial buyer–seller relation-
ship, few studies have shown how salespeople establish
such bonds with their buyers (Claycomb & Martin, 2002). If
part of a salesperson’s skill set is to know how to initiate and
nurture a strong relationship with a client (Rich & Smith,
2000), the sales literature should analyze what successful
relationship sellers do with their clients in a social context
* Corresponding author. Tel.: +353 1 7168959; fax: +353 1 7168019.
E-mail addresses: susi.geiger@ucd.ie (S. Geiger)8
darach.turley@ucd.ie (D. Turley).
1
Tel.: +353 1 7007496; fax: +353 1 7005446.
0019-8501/$ - see front matter D 2004 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.indmarman.2004.09.006
to sales practice and research.
This paper examines how successful salespeople in
business-to-business selling use the social event to initiate,
enhance and maintain a friendly and fruitful buyer relation-
ship. It extends a concept formulated over 30 years ago,
namely how salespeople dcultivateT their client relationships
through social interaction (Bigus, 1972). While sales
research in the intervening years has referred to the positive
effects of social bonding on the development and main-
tenance of buyer–seller relationships (Crosby, Evans, &
Cowles, 1990; Jacobs, Hyman, & McQuitty, 2001; Jap,
Manolis, & Weitz, 1999), it has failed to address such
specific questions as the range of appropriate socializing
behaviors, the mechanics of client social interaction, and the
impact of such interaction on both relationship and sales
outcomes. Presenting the results of a qualitative investiga-
tion of industrial salespeople involved in long-term buyer–
seller relationships, this study elaborates on the inner
workings of socializing behaviors and proposes a frame-
work to assess both relational and sales outcomes of such
264 S. Geiger, D. Turley / Industrial Marketing Management 34 (2005) 263–273
behaviors. The article concludes by offering recommenda-
tions on how sales management can encourage staff to
engage in productive cultivating activities with their clients.
2. Socializing behaviors in personal selling
Taking up Macneil’s (1980) distinction between discrete
and relational exchange, Dwyer et al. (1987) were the first
marketing scholars to propose a framework on how buyer–
seller relationships develop. Their discussion points to the
fact that relationship maintenance activities such as
dcourting and wooingT occur not only at the beginning of
a relationship, but continue for the duration of the entire
relationship cycle. This long-term perspective was high-
lighted by Crosby et al. (1990) who emphasize the value of
contact intensity, that is, bsimply staying in touch . . . and
personal touches such as cards and giftsQ (p. 76), for
improving relationship quality. Social bonding between
buyer and seller seems to enhance trust (Doney & Cannon,
1997), equity (Boles, Johnson, & Barksdale, 2000),
communication (Boorom, Goolsby, & Ramsey, 1998),
friendliness (Jap et al., 1999) and intimacy (Sharma,
Tzokas, Saren, & Kyziridis, 1999). Personal satisfaction,
commitment and sometimes even friendship are seen as
personal benefits of intimate buyer–seller relationships
(Butcher, Sparks, & O’Callaghan, 2002). Thus, social
bonding between buyer and seller in a business context is
an important antecedent of relationship quality; it increases
the probability of continued exchange as well as the amount
of personal satisfaction drawn from the interaction.
Despite this evidence, few studies have so far attempted
to examine how sellers manage to create and maintain social
bonds with their clients. While a number of studies
investigated elements of social interaction in the sales call
itself (Jacobs et al., 2001; Jap et al., 1999), none appears to
systematically explore social bonding in the context of out-
of-office client socializing. Sharma et al. (1999) note that
client socializing can paradoxically both enhance and
threaten relationships; they fail however to shed more
precise light on how and under what circumstances the
social event can be used to forge client relationships. In their
study on the socializing behavior of purchasing agents,
Brown, Boya, Humphreys, and Wielding (1993) identify
two clusters of industrial buyers. The dhigh socializersT tend
to engage in after hour meetings and social chat during the
sales call more so than dlow socializersT. dHigh socializersT
also tend to be younger and located in smaller purchasing
departments than their dlow socializingT counterparts. While
Brown et al. (1993) admonish salespeople to adapt to these
different interaction styles, they elaborate neither the nature
of social interaction nor the functional impact of socializing
on the buyer–seller dyad itself.
For the purpose of this paper, we define socializing
behaviors as client-related activities engaged in by industrial
and services sales personnel that take place outside the
normal business environment. Such behaviors can be
initiated either by the salesperson himself, by the client or
by the selling firm. They all involve a personal face-to-face
interaction between salesperson and client and are set within
the context of the strategic client relationship. An overview
of the relevant selling and social psychological literatures in
relation to this concept suggests four central themes, namely
the issue of role enactment, contextual influences, self-
disclosure, and power distribution. These will now be
discussed in turn.
2.1. Socializing behaviors and role enactment
Bendapudi and Berry (1997) discuss social interaction in
relation to customers’ motivations for maintaining rela-
tionships with service providers. They differentiate
between dintra-roleT social interaction that occurs within
the exchange relationship, and dextra-roleT social inter-
action occurring outside the business relationship. They
argue that extra-role social interaction may be more
influential in increasing buyer–seller linkages than intra-
role social bonding because the former provides a more
diverse set of ties than the latter. Thus, by broadening the
tapestry of enacted roles underpinning the buyer–seller
relationship, extra-role social interaction can play a vital
part in relationship maintenance and perceived customer
dependence.
2.2. Socializing behaviors and contextual variables
From a social interactionist perspective, the setting in
which a buyer–seller interaction occurs can be seen as an
binteractive theatreQ (Prus, 1989, p. 24), a stage on which
players perform what they believe to be appropriate roles
and where they in turn hold certain role expectations of
other players. On this basis, a change of setting, from office
to restaurant for instance, can be expected to translate into
some alterations in the timbre of the relationship. Price and
Arnould (1999) discuss the influence of setting on the
development of social bonds between service provider and
client. In their examination of hairdressers, it is in fact the
servicescape that provides a dsacredT space where the social
relationship can be developed. Thus, one of the central
issues in the function of client entertainment seems to be the
impact of the setting in which such entertainment takes
place. It can be argued that both salesperson and buyer may
adapt their role behavior to the less structured environment
in an out-of-office setting, allowing different aspects of their
relationship to develop.
2.3. Socializing behaviors and self-disclosure
Encounters between buyer and seller in an out-of-office
setting are likely to lead to qualitatively and quantitatively
different exchanges from those occurring in the office
environment. Such encounters might also be expected to
 S. Geiger, D. Turley / Industrial Marketing Management 34 (2005) 263–273
result in higher levels of personal self-disclosure. Mutual
self-disclosure has long been considered a vital ingredient
for close client–seller relationships (Crosby et al., 1990). In
a recent study, Jacobs et al. (2001) examined the effect of
what they call exchange-specific self-disclosure versus
social self-disclosure on clients’ trust, satisfaction and
salesperson attraction in the context of insurance sales.
They found that the more information about non-business
related topics such as hobbies or family was exchanged,
the more clients expressed satisfaction, trust and attraction
towards salespeople. In this study, which examined sales
interactions in a controlled environment, the average length
of social self-disclosure in the sales call was half a minute.
Research has yet to confirm whether more prolonged
social exchange outside the office environment leads to
higher levels of self-disclosure and an enhanced relational
dividend.
2.4. Socializing behaviors and power distribution
Self-disclosure is one of the interpersonal relationship
aspects that are based on the norm of reciprocity (Gouldner,
1960). One of the issues that need to be examined in relation
to salespeople’s cultivating activities is whether such
interaction leads to greater reciprocity between buyer and
seller than interaction that is exclusively exchange-based.
Bigus (1972) devotes much thought to the role of
dcultivating strategiesT undertaken by milkmen anxious to
maintain and broaden their customer base. For these
salesmen, accepting cups of coffee in their customers’
homes for example is a vital factor both in getting to know
the customer on a personal basis and in progressing a purely
economic relationship to a bpseudo friendshipQ (Bigus,
1972, p. 153). It is also a central step in moving the
relationship from one characterized by extreme asymmetry
to one that is more symmetrical. Thus, it may be conjectured
that socializing activities can also reconfigure the power
distribution between buyer and seller.
In summary, although relationship quality and satisfac-
tion have been linked to the level of social bonding between
buyer and seller, the extent to which out-of-office socializ-
ing contributes to social bonding in particular and relation-
ship maintenance in general has yet to be ascertained.
Furthermore, as even the most intimate buyer–seller
relationship is not an end in itself but rather a means to a
commercial end (Geiger & Turley, 2003), the degree to
which client socializing can further the business aspect of a
client relationship also needs to be established.
3. Methodology
The objective of the study is to examine the role non-
business related activities such as social meetings after
hours play in today’s business-to-business selling environ-
ment. Given the scant treatment of this issue in the literature,
265
it was decided to engage in an exploratory investigation.
The identification of broad themes from the pertinent
literature, as outlined above, served as a basis to design an
interview guide. The guide was used as a parameter for
investigation but was not meant to restrict the research
participants in their accounts. Twenty-four business-to-
business sellers working across the Republic of Ireland
participated in the study. In order to investigate the impact
of socializing under different environmental conditions, it
was decided to maximize variance across the sample on
three dimensions: size, sector, and level of socializing. The
sample incorporated salespeople operating in service indus-
tries such as real estate, as well as product sectors such as
food manufacturing. It also included respondents from
industries traditionally associated with high levels of
socializing such as advertising together with participants
operating in environments such as food manufacturing
where such socializing is typically more restricted (Porter,
1999). The size of the sales organizations varied from 5 to
80 sellers. In three cases, several sales professionals from
the same company were interviewed in order to investigate
the impact of organizational regimes on individuals’ social-
izing behaviors (see Table 1).
Sales organizations were approached personally by the
authors and solicited to name a sales representative and/or
sales manager as respondent. Interviews were conducted by
one of the authors in the informant’s workplace with the
help of a semi-structured interview guide drafted on the
basis of the literature review, and subsequently modified in
the light of emerging concepts (Strauss & Corbin, 1998).
Individual interviews lasted an average of 60 to 90 min and
were verbatim transcribed by the authors. Data were coded
separately by the two authors of this paper using the QSR
NVivo software. This software is an administrative aid
rather than a substitute for the analytical input of researchers
and is used extensively in the social sciences to organize
qualitative data (Weitzman, 2000). In joint recoding sessions
data were then recoded, research logs drafted and any
divergences between the two coders resolved. The primary
data collection continued until no further new concepts
emerged from the data (Strauss & Corbin, 1998). The final
sample of 24 respondents is similar to sample sizes in
published exploratory studies in relationship selling (e.g.
Butcher et al., 2002; Jap et al., 1999; Sharma et al., 1999).
Table 1 illustrates the emerging concepts and the interviews
in which they occurred.
4. Data analysis
Client entertainment appears to be an integral part of
most sales professionals’ existence. Even though the
emphasis placed on the social event may differ depending
on the industry, a certain level of out-of-office contact with
clients seems to be standard practice in most business-to-
business sectors. All of the sales professionals who
266 S. Geiger, D. Turley / Industrial Marketing Management 34 (2005) 263–273

Table 1
Functions of socializing behaviors by industry
Interview no. Firm Industry Functions of socializing behaviors
Preamble Thank you card Air filter Icebreaker Knowledge generator Insurance policy
1 A Media U U
2 B* PR U U U
3 B* PR U U U
4 C Advertising U U
5 D Advertising U
6 E Advertising U
7 F* Financial U U U
8 F* Financial U U U
9 F* Financial U U
10 G Real estate U U U
11 H Drinks U U U U
12 I Drinks U
13 J* Food U U
14 J* Food U
15 K Food U U U
16 L Food U
17 M Pharma U U
18 N Pharma U U
19 O Pharma U U U
20 P Pharma U U U
21 Q Instruments U U U U
22 R Hardware U U
23 S Building U
24 T Machinery U U U
* Multiple respondents drawn from one company in that sector.

participated in this study engage in socializing with clients
and notice a certain expectation in this regard on the part of
the client:
But also if you don’t socialize, if you don’t do that sort of
thing it would be perceived very, very badly. Because
everybody else does it. What we have tried to do over the
last few years is to be inventive and different in the way we
spend money rather than doing all the things that all the
other people do, the other insurance companies. But
entertainment is actually unfortunately critical, it shouldn’t
be really. But it IS extremely important (Financial Services).
The results of this investigation show that while all
salespeople do socialize with their clients, they differ in their
perceptions of the significance and likely outcomes of such
events. Depending on the type and depth of interaction
desired by both the salesperson and the buyer, social outings
can be undertaken either with a view to enhancing the
business aspects of the client relationship or alternatively
with a view to progressing its relational dimension. Fig. 1
presents an a posteriori conceptual framework that groups
the emergent concepts under their main functional impact—
relational or business catalyst—on the buyer–seller relation-
ship. This framework also presents two important moderat-
ing variables of socializing strategies suggested by the data,
namely ethical considerations and the cultural context of the
buyer–seller interaction. It should be noted that this frame-
work is introduced to guide the discussion of the emerging
concepts on the clear understanding that it is an outcome,

Fig. 1. A framework for assessing the impact of socializing behaviors.

 S. Geiger, D. Turley / Industrial Marketing Management 34 (2005) 263–273
rather than a starting point, for data analysis. Where
appropriate, verbatims are used to illuminate individual
concepts (Strauss & Corbin, 1998).
4.1. The social event as a business catalyst
4.1.1. The social event as a preamble
In today’s business world, a buyer’s attention is at a
premium. For many sellers, securing and holding a client’s
undivided attention can represent a greater challenge than
actually closing the sale. Thus, from an exchange perspec-
tive, the most basic outcome of a social outing is the time
and attention that a client is, in a sense, obligated to afford a
supplier. Even if no direct sales objectives are attached to
the social outing, the salesperson obtains a chance to get his
message across and to attain a higher level of buyer
awareness. Many participants in this study mentioned this
fact as the fundamental direct benefit accruing from the
social outing. The social event, especially if it takes the form
of a joint activity, is frequently used in order to get a
message across that may be lost in the buyer’s busy office
environment:
The common denominator in our business would be the golf
outing. And the advantage of that is that you havesomebody’s
undivided attention for about four hours (Hardware).
It seems that even from an exchange perspective, the
proverbial business done on the golf course does not
actually feature as the prime goal of a social outing. The
majority of salespeople interviewed for this study do not
attempt a direct sales pitch on the golf course or anywhere
else outside the office. However, salespeople know that
social events can represent a forum where some of the
defenses purchasers may have cultivated against sales
overtures can be neutralized:
I would see it as probably the most important thing to get
them to relax and to open up, and to create a nice
environment that is conducive to us presenting to them later
on (Pharmaceutical).
Hence, a social event can predispose the buyer to be
more receptive to subsequent sales overtures. It also
increases awareness of the salesperson’s products or
services and, most importantly, of the sales rep as a person.
It puts the buyer in a receptive mode; according to the
interviewees, purchasers find it more difficult to ignore
telephone calls or slam doors into sales reps’ faces after a
joint activity outside the office. Thus, on the most basic
level, the social event opens up avenues for sales
approaches that were previously cordoned off.
In the context of building awareness, social events are
also sometimes used as a brand-building exercise, partic-
ularly if they come under the heading of corporate
entertainment:
267
In a lot of cases you do get involved in social outings, a golf
outing, a day at the races, and I think it is important to
support the company as a brand. A lot of the time we forget
that * is a brand that we have to market as well and we have
to sell. And through these corporate events you can build a
certain image and a certain profile (Cosmetics).
Many sales reps recognize that the impact of corporate
entertainment, as an attempt to increase awareness of a
supplier’s brand, is dependent on both the willingness of the
purchaser to be entertained and on the activities engaged in
by competitors. While acknowledging the competitive
necessity to participate in corporate activities such as
invitations to the theater, sponsored sports events or client
dinners, interview participants seemed to prefer one-on-one
entertainment with their clients to these larger corporate
events. It appears that the extra time with the client afforded
by a more personalized social event can be most fruitful in
exploring previously undetected sales leads or developing a
long-term sales strategy:
Day to day, when you are just reacting to the immediate
requirements, you don’t have the time to think about the
long-term requirements that they might have. So social
occasions allow us an open forum for that kind of
discussion (Advertising).
In the same vein, the attention a buyer can give to a
salesperson during a social outing can be used to expand on
previous discussions with the client:
A lot of the time at such lunches you can actually change
their mind set if they are thinking of doing something and
they are not too sure. In a much more relaxed environment
as opposed to having them at a meeting, if you are in a more
relaxed environment, sometimes you can talk them round to
doing something that they weren’t too sure about, they were
nervous about (Advertising).
Serendipitously, during the more relaxed interaction
outside the office, a seller may also learn about cross-selling
opportunities that may not have emerged in the daily business
interaction. One interviewee recounted how an entire interna-
tional business strategy involving the seller’s firm came about
through a lunch that turned into a brainstorming session.
Again, day-to-day interactions during office hours do not
seem to offer the time and distance for more strategic, long-
term reflections. Interestingly, a number of research partic-
ipants appeared to be aware of this strategic role of client
socializing and admitted that they engaged in a post-mortem
analysis of social events. While they are aware that enter-
tainment budgets are difficult to quantify in terms of a cost–
benefit analysis, these sales professionals recognize the
business potential of social contacts to increase corporate
and personal awareness, cultivate cross-selling opportunities
and foster long-term strategy planning.
268 S. Geiger, D. Turley / Industrial Marketing Management 34 (2005) 263–273
Therefore, from an exchange perspective, it seems that
the buyer–seller social event acts primarily as a forum to
open up vistas for future business development. Even
though contracts are rarely signed on the golf course, seeds
are sown for future sales overtures, corporate bonds, and
enhanced brand awareness.
4.1.2. The social event as thank you card
Another important, if almost intuitive, sales-related
function of the social event is to acknowledge the
importance of the client and his business for the individual
salesperson and the selling firm. One of the top 10
relationship selling objectives in a study carried out among
commercial service providers was to bhelp customers to feel
appreciated for doing businessQ with the seller’s company
(Claycomb & Martin, 2002, p. 619). It seems that in this
context, a well-planned social event is the best dthank-you
cardT a client can receive:
You do take customers for granted, whether you are doing
your best not to, you can still fall into this trap where they
make it so easy for you, you feel it’s always going to be that
way. And humans are like that, we always fall into this
taken-for-granted trap. And it’s important to take the time to
make them feel that you value them very much, but also to
remind them why this is still happening (Building materials).
Positive reinforcement for a client’s business commit-
ment through thank-you letters has frequently been shown
to increase customer satisfaction (Martin & Adams, 1999)
as well as the chance of repeat purchase (Bergiel &
Trosclair, 1985). The added advantage of the social outing
as a sign of the seller’s appreciation for a client’s business is
that the salesperson can personalize it according to the
client’s preferences and can demonstrate a simultaneous
ongoing commitment to the client:
The most important thing is that every single customer that
we have likes to feel that they are the most important customer
that we have, and if you can genuinely make them feel
important—and I don’t mean that in a very flippant way, I
don’t mean that by being all over them all the time, but I mean
that by being genuinely with them and go and spending time
talking to them and giving them your time (Pharmaceutical).
Thus, in terms of what has been called baffective
engineeringQ (Claycomb & Martin, 2002, p. 624), enter-
taining a client socially delivers a stronger message than a
simple telephone call or thank-you letter as it is more
personalized and contains an experiential aspect; it also has
the added advantage of signaling the seller’s ongoing
willingness to engage in the relationship.
4.1.3. The social event as an air filter
Interestingly, it appears that from an exchange perspec-
tive, the social event can also act as a catalyst for customer
complaints concerning service delivery. Apparently, some
clients are more comfortable airing their grievances in a
social rather than a workplace environment where com-
plaints may immediately take on an dofficialT aura:
Plus usually what may happen from a work point of view is
also when you have something controversial, when the
person is not happy, something that they are not willing to
talk about over the phone, when they are down in a social
event then they will give you the controversial things. So
often you find out the things that are really bugging that
person which they are not willing to say when they are
ringing you up because it’s just too controversial (Financial
Services).
Clients’ proneness to voice their problems outside the
office seems to be a phenomenon sales personnel witness
across industries. It is known that many corporate clients are
reluctant to complain even when their expectations fail to be
fulfilled by service or product providers (Smith, 2000). This
may be due to the psychological and time costs associated
with complaining behavior (Hansen, Powers, & Swan,
1997). It is conceivable that social events lower these
perceived costs for the buyer and provide a convenient
opportunity to voice dissatisfaction in a non-adversarial
setting. This element of the social event can thus be crucial
for the early detection of any dissatisfaction with product or
service delivery.
To conclude this section, even if a social outing does not
result in the signing of a new contract, it can nonetheless act
as a catalyst for business development in several ways. First,
it can predispose the client to future sales messages and
cross-selling endeavors as well as acting as dtime-outT to
ponder long-term business development. Second, it can
show the client that his business is still appreciated. Finally,
it can be a crucial opportunity to detect nascent client
dissatisfaction with the products and services received.
It is worth noting that even though the above cultivating
strategies have been viewed from the perspective of
furthering the business side of the relationship, any of these
three strategies can also further the relational side of the
buyer–seller interaction.
4.2. The social event as a relationship catalyst
Above and beyond the business factors discussed above,
the social event can also be an indispensable tool to expedite
the interpersonal relationship between a buyer and a seller.
The following sections discuss how salespeople perceive the
role of client cultivating in the development of a strong
personal buyer–seller relationship.
4.2.1. The social event as an icebreaker
It has been claimed that the transition from a purely
transactional to a relational exchange in the business selling
context can be a fluid one (Liljander & Roos, 2002). The
 S. Geiger, D. Turley / Industrial Marketing Management 34 (2005) 263–273
relational phase in which both partners signal interest in
ongoing exchange and test the waters for signs of commit-
ment by the other party has been termed dexplorationT
(Dwyer et al., 1987). In this phase, both buyers and sellers
have minimal investment in the interaction as well as
minimal interdependence, and they seek to establish a cost/
benefit assessment of the relational proposition. During this
time, strategic client cultivation can be very useful as an
dicebreakerT to enhance communication between both
parties and introduce a personal level of interaction:
Q: Would you take your clients out to social occasions,
lunches, dinners? A: Yes, we try to do this as much as we
can, because it is a great way of breaking down the
barriers. There is nothing like having a few drinks with
somebody and having a laugh with him. It inevitably
improves relationships, even if it is only for a short time.
Straight away, you see it in the client the next day: you take
him out to lunch today, you see it in the way he behaves
tomorrow. On the phone, in person, everything. It is so
much more, you are pals, working with you as opposed to
against you (Advertising).
If you bring a customer whether it is to see an instrument
somewhere or go for dinner with him, that breaks down
barriers. Because they see you as an individual and not just
as a salesperson (Pharmaceutical).
Thus, a client relationship can be progressed from the
stage of dstrangerT to that of dacquaintanceT (Butcher et al.,
2002), allowing for an assessment of mutual attraction as
well as improved communication. It seems that even hostile
clients intent on an adversarial relationship with a sales-
person may be disarmed by a well-orchestrated social outing
and coaxed into a closer relationship with the seller, as the
following anecdote illustrates:
[T]here was one guy, . . .he was there ready to tear us to
strips. . . . And we brought them out for dinner and we said
to ourselves the one thing we would do would be not a
single word about business. And that’s what we did. . . .And
it broke the ice with him, because he had come, he had met
us twice and neither time had he talked business, both times
had been all about having a bit of a laugh. And we had now
gone from a situation where we would have sat with him
and if we had negotiated first thing he would have been
prepared to go hammer and tong. And it was more
easygoing, the negotiation was more easygoing, more
relaxed, and we came to an agreement, and the client was
on air a week later (Media).
According to this interviewee and many others, the social
occasion can jumpstart a personal relationship between
salesperson and client. As it introduces a non-adversarial
level of interaction, it muffles any mutual aggressiveness
and represents a shortcut for the more lengthy relationship
269
building effort within the confines of the business environ-
ment. It is noteworthy that a deliberate avoidance of
business issues during the social outing seems to be a
common tactic employed to nurture the interpersonal
dimension of the relationship (Kahle, 2002). It may be that
this switch of communicative register can be used to signal a
switch in relational mode from dstage 0T to dstage 1T, as one
interviewee expressed it.
4.2.2. The social event as a knowledge generator
If the social outing can be successfully used to move
from dstrangerT to dacquaintanceT, it seems that it can equally
help individuals forge even closer bonds with their relational
partners, progressing from dacquaintanceT to dfriendT
(Butcher et al., 2002):
One-hundred per cent, absolute 100 per cent I am certain
that what gets you over to the next level is down to the
personal relationship, the trust, the individual, how do they
bond with you, do they like you, do they get on with you.
And that’s down to—I found you got usually over, you can
make the outside of the fence with them where they trust
you, but they haven’t let you into the inner circle of minds.
Where you get inside that is usually being away on a trip,
abroad when you brought them somewhere, that’s where
you break down barriers (Real Estate).
Research has found that mutual knowledge and identi-
fication are vital antecedents of trust in client relationships
(Liljander & Roos, 2002). Social outings are ideal occasions
to increase intimate self-disclosure, thus enhancing mutual
understanding between the parties and paving the way for a
genuinely personal relationship:
One night I was out with J. [a client] and she just mentioned
that they were doing their house up. She was in late one
morning and I tried to ring her and I couldn’t figure out why,
but she was just organizing stuff for the house and doing the
house up and it was taking up an awful lot of her time. They
weren’t radical things, but they did—you say doh, now that
makes sense, now I understandT. (Financial Services).
At this stage of the relationship building effort, the most
crucial interpersonal task is to convey a sense of trust and
mutual understanding to the other person. Social outings
represent an ideal way to discover what clients dare really
likeT and in turn letting them see the real self behind the
salesperson’s mask. This move from a dparticularistT to a
dholisticT perspective on the relationship partner (Gaska &
Frey, 1996) is essential if a salesperson is to change the
modality of a relationship; it is most effectively achieved in
a space outside the business environment where the
respective role sets are less formal and the setting stimulates
non-business related conversation. In addition, socializing is
a face-to-face contact and thus boasts all the advantages of a
personal, multi-channel interaction. Thus, the social outing
270 S. Geiger, D. Turley / Industrial Marketing Management 34 (2005) 263–273
represents a unique opportunity for the salesperson to make
himself non-substitutable in the client relationship. It also
represents a chance for the salesperson to form a holistic
perspective on the client, above and beyond the narrow role
connotation of dbuyerT. This understanding in turn should
allow the salesperson to refine and improve service
offerings to the client:
I find that the ones where I REALLY get inside their heads,
the best time to meet them is not Monday to Friday, it’s
Saturday, that’s when their mind is clearest. Those are the
people I would know, I almost make a point out of never
meeting them in an office situation, I’d meet them at their
house, or meet them somewhere just outside the construc-
tion environment. And that’s important to always keep it that
way. I try to do it on Saturdays, so they see what you are all
about as well, you are not in a suit, you are in your own
clothes, they see what you like, certainly to get to that level
you can’t just rely on picking up the phone and having met
up with them in the office and inviting them for lunch, you
never get to that level of relationship by just relying on that
(Real Estate).
Meeting the client outside a business context in a dprivate
capacityT can highlight that the relationship involves more
than just an economic dimension. Another way to signal that
the interpersonal dimension has assumed an importance
over and above the business dimension is to include the
private environment of the participants in the social event.
Many salespeople who aim to develop dpseudo friendshipsT
with their clients (Bigus, 1972) make sure to invite the
clients’ and their own partners along to the social outing.
For a similar reason, some salespeople make a point of
taking the client out on a personal rather than a company
budget:
If you entertain them on a company budget they know it
and you know it, it’s company entertainment and there’s a
reason for it. If you put your hand in your own pocket, and
you go out and you’re having a drink until two in the
morning with someone and you say: look I buy you a pint
and they buy you one back, then you KNOW there is a
relationship, more a friendship, whereas if you go down
and you are producing your company credit card and say:
right, we have a meal here and bladibla, it’s sterile, there
is a bottom line to it, the company are paying for this
friendship (Measuring Instruments).
As this vignette illustrates, the strategic business agenda
virtually disappears in some social events. In such instances,
the social event is almost exclusively geared toward
strengthening the interpersonal relationship; potential effects
on business dealings become secondary spin-offs of the
social interaction. Social outings help fill gaps in mutual
understanding between buyer and seller. At the same time, a
deeper insight into respective personalities generates a
feeling of belonging and thus creates an interpersonal realm
that is unique to the participants, a realm situated at a much
deeper level than the artificial dclosenessT often generated
either by corporate entertainment or the perfunctory chit-
chat that precedes most sales calls. Many successful
salespeople seem to know intuitively that the effects of
social interaction, namely shared experience, social disclo-
sure and a widening of role prescriptions, will cement a
client relationship and create a degree of personal depend-
ence that may only be challenged if one of the participants
leaves their present position and withdraws from the
relationship (Bendapudi & Leone, 2002).
4.2.3. The social event as an insurance policy
One of the most interesting aspects of this study was that
socializing can be seen by some salespeople as not only
cementing the client relationship, but also as creating a
buffer zone in times of conflict:
And it makes life easier, it gets you through difficult
situations easier if you have met somebody at a different
level or in a non-business sense. It’s easier to deal with,
certainly it’s harder for somebody to be mad at you or to be
annoyed with you if you’ve been out to dinner the night
before, or if you were at a show last week or if you played
golf. They might be annoyed, but at least it might be
controlled fury rather than uncontrolled fury. And it’s easier
to deal with controlled fury in some ways (Financial
services).
However, a close relationship between a buyer and a
seller does not mean that conflict is completely eliminated
from the interaction (Dwyer et al., 1987). It seems that the
social outing, by promoting trust, intimate mutual under-
standing and reciprocity in the relationship, acts as a form of
insurance policy for the salesperson. Some respondents
mentioned that client socializing creates a neutral plane of
interaction to which the relational partners can retreat if the
business interaction hits stormy waters. If a buyer–seller
relationship has been built up exclusively in a business
context and a business-related problem subsequently
emerges, then communication may be put on hold until
the conflict has been resolved. However, if interaction on a
social level can be maintained, lines of communication will
remain open and conflict resolution will be achieved more
easily.
To summarize this section, client cultivating can repre-
sent a tool that can be used to break down barriers and
reduce client resistance to a relationship with the seller.
Once a relationship has been established, the social event
can in turn be used to enhance and deepen it through the
promotion of trust and intimate mutual understanding in
such a way that it serves as a parallel plane of interaction to
the business relationship itself. This parallel line of
interaction specifically comes into its own in times of
conflict in the business domain.
 S. Geiger, D. Turley / Industrial Marketing Management 34 (2005) 263–273
4.3. Moderators of socializing behaviors
The preceding section sought to furnish an overview of
how a variety of socializing behaviors can be marshaled in
the service of progressing the business and relational aspects
of client relationships. It was seen how socializing behaviors
could impact on these two aspects either individually or in
tandem. However, business-to-business selling, no less than
any other commercial activity, does not take place in a
normative and prescriptive vacuum; it is always embedded
in a particular socio-cultural context. Two additional
constructs, bethical perceptionsQ and bcultural contextQ, have
been factored into the model as mediating variables to
reflect respondents’ awareness of this contextual embedded-
ness. Each will now be discussed in turn.
4.3.1. Ethical perceptions
While socializing can have a range of positive effects on
the buyer–seller relationship, it may be important to keep it to
a level that is within industry standards. Porter (1999) reports
on a survey among US purchasing agents, which shows that
35% of all respondents are prohibited from accepting supplier
favors such as golf outings or tickets to sporting events. As
more and more firms draw up codes of ethics that tell
purchasing agents what favors to accept or decline from
salespeople, a seller eager to deepen a client relationship may
find himself limited in his cultivating efforts by personal or
corporate codes of ethics. Therefore, Fig. 1 posits bethical
perceptionsQ as a mediating variable. Intuitively, the deploy-
ment of substantial hospitality and socializing budgets for the
purpose of cultivating relationships with clients would be
expected to raise ethical and legal concerns. That said,
matters ethical did not loom large in the mindsets of the
informants in this study, at least not overtly. Only one
respondent adverted explicitly to the impact of ethical
parameters on his work-practices by pointing out how larger
corporations and public bodies are increasingly incorporating
ethics codes into their purchasing procedures.
One explanation for the paucity of ethical considerations
on the part of informants could well be that, as noted by
Dubinsky, Jolson, Michaels, Kotabe, and Lim (1992), sales
personnel typically expect management to take the initiative
in setting the boundaries for what constitutes ethical selling
behavior. It should also be born in mind that the primary
focus of this particular study was the relational outcomes of
socializing rather than its ethical ramifications. The flow of
the interviews may thus have mitigated against a more
explicit discussion of these ramifications. Nonetheless, the
face validity of any proposed model of socializing would be
considerably enhanced by the inclusion of bethical
perceptionsQ as a mediating variable. Ideally, it would
comprise two subsidiary dimensions: the degree of moral
intensity with which a salesperson views a specific course of
action (Jones, 1991) and the corporate ethical values of the
organization to which he or she belongs (Hunt, Wood, &
Chonko, 1989).
271
4.3.2. Cultural context
On a related note, it seems that the cultural setting in
which buyer–seller relationships take place is another
mediating variable to take into account when evaluating
potential effects of socializing behaviors. In a recent paper,
Mullin Marta, Singhapadki, Attia, and Vitell (2004) have
indicated how many Middle Eastern marketers, for instance,
do not engage in drinking alcohol—a socializing behavior
that would not be uncommon in the Irish sales setting
examined in this study. Similarly, the acceptability and
extent of social self-disclosure may vary substantially across
different cultures (Jacobs et al., 2001). While this study
examined socializing behaviors specifically in an Irish
context, some of the respondents with international sales
experience were aware of cross-cultural particularities in
approaching buyers socially. One such factor related to
Ireland’s relatively small geographical size. Our informants
reported how this physical concentration both facilitates
and, in a sense, necessitates a modicum of social interaction
with clients. On the one hand, sales territories tend to be
concentrated and manageable, and social interaction is thus
facilitated by the proximity of both salesperson and client.
Equally, this same proximity is likely to result in frequent
extra-mural contacts at sporting, social, neighborhood and
professional gatherings.
It has also been suggested that some cultures have a
higher propensity than others to using a problem-solving
approach in sales interactions (Mintu-Wimsatt & Gassen-
heimer, 2002). Buyers in such cultures are likely to be more
receptive to social overtures by sellers than purchasers
reared in cultures that place more emphasis on aggressive-
ness in sales interactions. Therefore, cultural context is
proposed as a second mediating variable impacting on both
relational and exchange outcomes of socializing behaviors.
5. Discussion
The preceding data analysis illustrates that in the area of
business-to-business selling, taking clients out socially can
benefit both business development and interpersonal rela-
tionships between buyer and seller. Client socializing can
thus be viewed as a valuable selling strategy aimed
primarily at long-term business building as well as fostering
and maintaining close client relationships.
It is apparent that such dcultivating strategiesT (Bigus,
1972) are always a means to an end. Their ultimate function
is to bring the inherently asymmetrical buyer–seller relation-
ship closer to a state of symmetry by creating interpersonal
bonds above and beyond the role prescriptions of the
business environment. These bonds, in turn, can positively
affect the level of communication in the relationship, can
move calculus-based trust toward knowledge and identi-
fication-based trust (Liljander & Roos, 2002) and can
increase relationship quality, strength and satisfaction (Bove
& Johnson, 2001). In this sense, client socializing can be
272 S. Geiger, D. Turley / Industrial Marketing Management 34 (2005) 263–273
posited as an important leveling mechanism in the relation-
ship selling repertoire that warrants increased attention from
both sales practitioners and academics. The implications of
this research on both these domains will now be discussed
individually.
5.1. Managerial implications
It seems that even in a climate of dwindling Travel and
Entertainment budgets (McMaster, 2002), the reduction of
financial resources spent on client entertainment may prove
shortsighted and counterproductive in the long term.
Customer value is clearly predicated on the maintenance
of customer relationships. While it may be difficult to
determine the exact return on investment for socializing
expenditures, the evidence from our respondents suggests
that this concern should not detract from the overall benefits
of socializing on a client relationship.
While corporate entertainment may be valuable as a
brand-building exercise, one-on-one socializing between a
sales rep and his clients can generate a significantly higher
relational dividend. We suggest that sales management
should encourage sales staff to engage in personalized social
activities with their clients, taking care that such activities are
in accord with ethical behavior, industrial standards, and
organizational policies. Sales managers could productively
integrate salesperson feedback from social events into
standard debriefing sessions with their sales force. Such
formalized exercises would aid salespeople in developing a
more reflective approach to their socializing behaviors, which
in turn would allow sales organizations to optimize the yield
from their entertainment efforts and develop a truly strategic
approach to client cultivation. It also seems desirable for
socializing behaviors and objectives to be incorporated in
sales training modules. In summary, this study calls for a
more judicious use of entertainment as part of an organ-
ization’s overall selling strategy, a use that remains sensitive
to both its complexities and potential dividends.
5.2. Research implications
The present study represents a first step in exploring
cultivating strategies as a relationship selling behavior.
Future research is needed to expand on the findings
presented. It appears vital, for example, to ascertain the
different forms and scope of cultivating strategies in
different business, service and industrial sectors. Our
findings suggest a tentative relationship between sector
and two particular forms of socializing. In the service sector,
a predominance of the social event as knowledge generator
was apparent, while in product-based industries it was
socialization as preamble that featured more prominently
(see Table 1). However, the necessarily small sample size
used in this study obviously precludes any general state-
ments of how socializing is used and valued in different
industry sectors.
Of equal interest would be further research into the
appropriate degree to which socializing spend and scope
should be devolved to the judgment of the individual
salesperson. The data presented here represent preliminary
evidence of a spectrum of such practice. At one end were
salespersons initiating such behavior seemingly on an ad hoc
basis and sometimes funded out of their own resources. At
the other extreme were sales staff who appeared to be selling
on behalf of firms who actively encouraged socializing and
held regular debriefings after each social event. Research
may also establish the extent to which ethical considerations
and codes of practice are perceived to interfere with
relationship building efforts in different industries.
Future research on socializing behaviors could determine
best practice in training the relational seller to expand his
role behaviors into the social realm. The proposed frame-
work may prove a useful template to introduce novices to
the concepts, cultural nuances, limitations, and benefits of
client socializing. These concepts can then be reinforced
through training practices such as mentoring or training on
the job.
It needs to be noted that this study is situated in the
context of the contemporary Irish business market. dClient
socializingT is clearly a socio-culturally constructed phe-
nomenon and, as such, its peculiar incarnations in different
selling milieus and cultural contexts warrant cross-cultural
comparison.
The most fundamental question in relation to cultivating
strategies, it seems, concerns the role performances and
expectations of both buyer and seller. Role theory, as outlined
by Solomon et al. (1985), appears to be a valuable tool in
analyzing the extent to which both cultivating participants
can or cannot stray from their initial role prescriptions as
buyer and seller in order to forge social bonds. Issues that may
be addressed from this perspective are, for example, the
interaction between private and public role repertoires in the
social interaction; the influence of the strategic selling
backdrop on expected and enacted role behaviors, and
crucially the precise effect of expanding role definitions on
the power balance in the buyer–seller relationship.
6. Conclusions
This study represents an initial foray into an area that has
been virtually overlooked in the academic literature: the
effects of client entertainment. Specifically, it has shown
that dcultivating strategiesT, that is, social activities aimed
predominantly at furthering the client relationship, may be
highly beneficial in realizing some of the theoretical
dividends of relationship selling, namely personal knowl-
edge, understanding, friendship and non-economic satisfac-
tion. Future research should build on the taxonomies and
insights presented here and investigate the extent to which
different cultivating activities—golf outings, invitations to
watch sports matches, dinners, travel, etc.—can be and are
 S. Geiger, D. Turley / Industrial Marketing Management 34 (2005) 263–273
used to achieve specific relational goals. Such research may
also be able to quantify cost–benefit ratios of client
entertainment both in selling and relational terms.
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Susi Geiger (PhD, Dublin City University) is a Lecturer at the University
College Dublin where she teaches and researches in the areas of personal
selling and consumer marketing.
Darach Turley (PhD, Dublin City University) is Associate Dean at Dublin
City University Business School and his main research interest is in the
consumer behavior of older consumers and the impact of bereavement on
consumption.