Mediating Effect of Customers’ Trust between the Association of Corporate Social Responsibility and Customers’ Loyalty: An Empirical Investigation from Telecom Sector

Corporate social responsibility plays a significant role in getting sustainable edge over competitors, gaining profits and enhancing business affairs with customers. The purpose of the study is to analyze the perception of consumers regarding the CSR and its impact on customers’ loyalty while trust mediates the link in the telecom context of Pakistan. The adopted questionnaire circulated among customers’ of different telecom companies through non probability sampling technique. The model was validated by confirmatory factor analysis through AMOS and hypotheses were investigated via path analysis. Findings revealed that CSR has a positive impact on customers’ loyalty and confirmed the mediating impact of trust between the association of CSR and customers’ loyalty. The current study provides literature regarding CSR, customer’s loyalty and trust that would be very useful for the marketing personnel of telecom companies in enhancing customers’ loyalty and trust by improving CSR practices. Additionally, the findings confirm the role of customers’ trust as a mediator between the link of CSR and customers’ loyalty. This study has also interesting implications for management of telecom companies in suggesting ways to enhance loyalty through corporate social responsibility.