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NAŠE GOSPODARSTVO / OUR ECONOMY 68 (4) 2022 Ledinger, S.
Sales Process as a Service (SPAS): Development and 
Validation of an Extension to the Shortened Selling 
Orientation – Customer Orientation (SOCO) Score 
(SOCO-SPAS)
Stefan Ledinger
PhD Student at the University of Applied Sciences Burgenland, Austria 
stefan.ledinger@gmx.at 
ARTICLE INFO
         
Original Scientific Article
Article History:
Received October 2022
Revised November 2022
Accepted December 2022
         
JEL Classification:
A13, M00, M39
         
Keywords:
Sales process
B2B sales
Customer orientation
Service orientation
Self-assessment
         
UDK: 658.818:330.123.6
DOI: 10.2478/ngoe-2022-0021
         
Cite this article as: Ledinger, S. (2022). 
Sales Process as a Service (SPAS): 
Development and Validation of an 
Extension to the Shortened Selling 
Orientation – Customer Orientation 
(SOCO) Score (SOCO-SPAS). Naše 
Gospodarstvo/Our Economy, 68(4), 28-42. 
DOI: 10.2478/ngoe-2022-0021. 
         
©2022 The Authors. Published by 
Sciendo on behalf of University of 
Maribor, Faculty of Economics and 
Business, Slovenia. This is an open access 
article under the CC BY-NC-ND license 
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/
by-nc-nd/4.0/). 
         
Abstract
The association between selling orientation and customer orientation and 
sales success has been a matter of intensive research since the publication of 
the selling orientation-customer orientation (SOCO) score in the early 1980’s. 
However, which attitudes predispose salespeople for high perfor-mance 
remains elusive. In addition, the association between customer orientation 
may be curvilinear and depend on the selling situation – and little research has 
been devoted to business-to-business (B2B) sales. This paper aims at starting 
to close those knowledge gaps through the development of a self-assessment 
tool for attitudes of salespeople. An extension of the 10-item SOCO score is 
developed through literature research in sales/business development and on 
service orientation in other settings. The score was subsequently validated 
through feedback by sales scholars. The extended score adds a dimension 
that tests whether professional salespeople consider the sales process as a 
service (SPAS) that should provide value beyond the identification of the best 
offering. Response rates by sales scholars was low, resulting in the need for 
further validation of the candidate SOCO-SPAS score. Business-to-business 
(B2B) relationships are an essential but understudied area of economics. The 
current paper provides a means to assess the relationship between attitudes 
and sales performance in modern B2B sales, by extending a scoring system 
that has originally been developed for B2C sales and many years in the past 
when market conditions were different than today. 
Introduction
Sales and business development are a key function in organizations, as a 
reliable stream of income is essential to their long-term existence. As sellers 
are often the most important contact and primary source of communication 
between a company and its customers (Sharma et al. 1999, Sharma 1990), 
there is an important role for B2B salespeople to play.
Surprisingly, compared to B2C, there is relatively little research in B2B 
(Lilien, 2016), and compared to B2B marketing, research in B2B sales is 
underrepresented, with about twice as many publications on B2B marketing 
compared to B2B sales (Google Scholar, 2022a; Google Scholar, 2022b).

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NAŠE GOSPODARSTVO / OUR ECONOMY 68 (4) 2022 Ledinger, S.
Customer orientation is among the more intensively 
researched topics in sales and B2B sales with more than 
20,000 hits in Google Scholar when searching for “customer 
orientation” and “sales” for the decade of 2012-2021 
(Google Scholar, 2022c). The literature about customer 
orientation in various settings, as well as scoring systems, 
will be extensively discussed in the following section. In 
this paper, a new concept that is related to, but is distinct 
from the classical definition of customer orientation is 
introduced: “Sales process as a service” (SPAS). In addition, a 
well-established scoring system, i.e. the selling orientation 
(SO) – customer orientation (CO) score, will be extended by a 
“sales process as a service” (SPAS) component. The resulting 
15-item score which can be used to assess how salesperson 
attitudes around selling orientation (5 item sub-score), 
customer orientation (5 item sub-score) and SPAS orientation 
(5 item sub-score) associate with sales performance. Before 
discussing the development and validation of the extended 
scoring system, the theoretical foundations leading to the 
concept of SPAS shall be discussed.
Theoretical Foundations
SOCO: Theoretical foundations and key findings
One of the seminal papers on customer orientation in sales 
has been published by Saxe and Weitz (1982), who have 
introduced the “selling orientation, customer orientation 
(SOCO) score”, a self-assessment tool for salespeople across 
24 items which help to find out whether a salesperson’s 
attitudes are rather towards finding the ideal solution for a 
customer, or towards seeking the sale under all circumstances, 
even if it is to the disadvantage of the customer. 
Customer orientation, however, has been a topic in scientific 
inquiry for much longer, tracing back to Bursk (1947), who 
has discussed low-pressure selling. Since the introduction 
of the SOCO score, many researchers have discussed 
factors that mediate the association between customer 
orientation and sales performance. For example, Smith 
and Hunt (1987) reported that honestly discussing the 
disadvantages of an offering as well as the advantages, 
is associated with improved sales performance. Homburg, 
Müller and Klarmann (2011) reported that the association 
between customer orientation and sales performance is 
not linear but that there is an optimum level of customer 
orientation that depends on the respective sales situation 
– with situations where individualized or premium products 
are being sold having a higher level of optimum customer 
orientation. Bateman and Valentine (2015) have shown 
that customer orientation improves multiple dimensions 
of customer evaluation of the salesperson (trust, assumed 
ethicality, and intention to purchase). Luthia and Strid 
(2020) have identified communication skills as a vital 
training element as antecedent of customer orientation. 
In an era in which many companies put a lot of emphasis 
on customer experience (Peñalba-Aguirrezabalaga et al., 
2021) and social selling (Barney-McNamara et al., 2020), 
customer orientation has remained relevant. The proposed 
shorter 10-item form of the SOCO score (Thomas, Soutar 
and Ryan, 2001) will serve as a basis for the development of 
an extended version for B2B sales.
Fully discussing the historic developments and changes in 
this field and related fields of research is beyond the scope 
of this article and are discussed more comprehensively in 
Ledinger and Attila (2022, in print). Further comprehensive 
reviews on the relationship between customer orientation 
and sales success have been published by Ohiomah, 
Benyoucef and Andreev (2020), as well as by Goad and 
Jaramillo (2014). A meta-analysis by Jaramillo et al. (2007) 
has confirmed SOCO as a significant predictor of sales 
performance.
Weaknesses of SOCO in B2B and definition of SPAS
Compared to B2C settings, sales literature in the B2B 
setting is scarce. However, the revised SOCO score has been 
shown to be applicable to B2B selling (Periatt, LeMay and 
Periatt, 2004). As the authors point out, the SOCO score, as 
well as the revised version have originally been developed 
with a focus on B2C selling. Although with conflicting 
results between studies, the original SOCO score has also 
been used in selected B2B studies (Jaramillo et al., 2007, 
302-303).
Due to the inherent differences between most B2C selling 
situations and most B2B selling situations, this leaves the 
original or revised SOCO scores sub-optimal to investigate 
the association between salesperson attitudes and sales 
performance.
Most importantly, the structure of B2B sales discussions 
is characterized by a much higher complexity, typically 
involving multiple participants and relationships that 
evolve over a long period of time. Consequently, relationship 
value is a topic of intense interest in B2B sales research 
(Hohenschwert & Geiger, 2015; Boles et al., 2000).  
Salespeople are often tasked with also providing service, thus 
the concept of sales being not just a business development 
function but also a service function is not foreign to sales 
scien-tists. However, as de Ruyter, Keeling and Yu (2019) 
point out in their comprehensive review on sales-service 

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NAŠE GOSPODARSTVO / OUR ECONOMY 68 (4) 2022 Ledinger, S.
ambidexterity, the focus point is typically the performance 
of sales tasks by service employees or the performance of 
service tasks by salespeople, but always in the pro-vision 
of the key organizational activity and in association with 
the direct pursuit of new business opportunities (i.e. 
the provision of a service might help uncover new sales 
opportu-nities). However, as Güneş et al. (2010, p. 168) have 
shown, using service activities as a means to find new sales 
opportunities can annoy customers and thus backfire.
This is where the concept of “sales process as a service” (SPAS) 
comes in. While the concept of sales-service ambidexterity 
assumes that the service interaction helps to uncover new 
business opportunities, the idea behind SPAS is that the 
sales process itself is a service that should provide value 
to the customer, as this might make the potential customer 
more inclined to take part in the sales process, enable and 
reduce customer and prospect resistance. Sales process as 
a service (SPAS) orientation in B2B sales shall be defined 
as an attitude that understands the sales process as a form 
of service that should itself be of value for the customer 
beyond helping the customer make the right purchasing 
decision. SPAS considers the sales process as an offering for 
the prospective client that should be designed like other 
types of product or service offerings, rather than simply a 
means to an end [i.e. making a sale].
Several authors have previously discussed the need to 
provide value to prospective clients in the sales process, 
which is a cornerstone of content marketing. As Jutkowitz 
(2014) states, “… corporations today can and should 
participate in the dynamic exchange of innovative ideas, 
unique knowledge, and expertise”. This implies that the 
sales process must provide value to the client, without 
immediately creating an obligation to purchase. Providing 
value in the sales process may occur, among other things, 
through the documentation and/or cus-tomer perception 
of competence (Zerbini, Golfetto & Gibbert, 2007; Belonax, 
Newell & Plank, 2007; Kaski et al., 2017). The knowledge 
of how to create customer value has also been discussed 
by Koponen, Julkunena and Asaib (2019), who consider it 
as a sub-competence of business acumen, which is as an 
essential component of communication competence. Value 
co-creation has also been described as a process that 
involves knowledge sharing and can provide improved 
outcomes through emotional factors such as inspiration, 
shared experience or alignment and reflection (Johnson et al., 
2021). Besides these scientific studies, the demonstration of 
expertise is intuitive to B2B sellers who are used to working 
with references or case studies, and to marketers who run 
corporate blogs, podcasts and alike at an increasing rate. 
The understanding of the sales process as a service is also 
in line with the Unified Service Theory (UST), which defines 
a service not as much through its intangibility but through 
the need for the customer to contribute significantly to 
the performance of the service (Sampson & Froehle 2006, 
p 334). This requirement is certainly met in complex B2B 
sales processes.
In summary, although value creation in sales is a well-
established concept, publications that discuss value 
creation in the sales process usually do not specifically 
address value that can be created and provided outside of 
the core offerings of a company.
Differentiation of SPAS and related concepts
Several other concepts that have drawn scientific attention 
need to be mentioned as related to the concept of SPAS. 
While a comprehensive review of these concepts is beyond 
the scope of this paper, selected publications from these 
shall briefly be discussed. 
Table 1 gives an overview of publications in adaptive selling, 
(customer) service orientation, service-dominant logic and 
value-based selling. Those concepts discuss the need to 
provide value, adapt to the specific customer situation and 
provide value to the customer and/or to define an offering 
broadly by the value the customer receives. All of those are 
relevant to the development of the SOCO-SPAS score, but 
the concept of SPAS is distinct from either of the concepts. 
The similarities and differences between those concepts 
and SPAS are briefly discussed in the table 1.
Methodology and Data
This paper discusses the development and validation of 
an extended version of the selling orientation – customer 
orientation (SOCO) score. While the original SOCO score 
(Saxe & Weitz, 1982) consisted of 24 items, the revised 
SOCO score (Thomas, Soutar & Ryan, 2001) consisted of 10 
items to test for selling- and customer orientation. With the 
current paper, the revised score is extended with 5 items 
that test for service orientation in the B2B sales process 
(SPAS). The development and validation of the SOCO-SPAS 
score has consisted of three phases:
1. Development of the candidate score items. For this 
purpose, the author has drawn from publications from 
sales research as well as about service orientation in 
other settings (drawing from and extending concepts 
as discussed in Chapter 1). Potential SPAS score items 

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NAŠE GOSPODARSTVO / OUR ECONOMY 68 (4) 2022 Ledinger, S.
have also drawn from extant literature about customer 
orientation of service workers (especially the personal-
ity trait assessment used in Brown et al., 2002).  Score 
items have been adapted as necessary to be potential-
ly suitable to the professional sales situation, where 
needed. In order to have a balance between items that 
may be as-sociated with a high service orientation, 
and items associated with low service orientation and 
thus avoid a potential social desirability bias, nega-
tively-stated items have been included that would be 
negatively scored. This is similar to the strategy chosen 
by Saxe and Weitz (1982). The 21 items selected as 
potential measures for SPAS are shown in Appendix 2, 
Table A2.1.
2. A questionnaire has been developed to test which 
items are most suitable to comprehensively test for the 
concept of understanding the sales process as a service, 
with as little correlation between the items on this 
dimension of the score, and the other dimensions of 
the scoring system. The questionnaire has been sent to 
525 scholars, which consisted of authors of the papers 
about the original and revised SOCO scores (n=16), 
as well as researchers who have cited the respective 
publications (n=414). Finally, leading sales researchers 
globally have been asked for their feedback (n=95) 
with the same questionnaire. Different links have been 
sent to the respective groups of researchers. The main 
intention was to validate the potential score items 
in a similar way to how the original SOCO score has 
been validated. Respondents were first asked to rate 
whether the potential items were “clearly”, “somewhat”, 
or “not” related to SPAS. In addition, they were asked 
which items they would or would definitely not choose 
among the 5 items to represent SPAS in the final score. 
In addition, respondents were asked to state whether 
any items were considered to strongly correlate, and 
to give any additional feedback. This approach was 
chosen in order to ensure nomological validity and to 
obtain responses von scholars who could be assumed 
to have a clear understanding of the intention behind 
the SOCO score.
Table 1 
Theoretical framework: concepts related to SPAS, and their differentiation from SPAS
Concept Key findings Differentiation SPAS
Adaptive selling
Spiro and Weitz (1990) Adaptive selling acknowledges that different customers and customers’ 
situa-tions require different sales approaches, as well as the competen-
cies to engage in adaptive behaviours. Development of Development 
of a self-assessment questionnaire to measure adaptive selling 
behaviours.
Adaptive selling addresses which 
selling style can be successful based on 
customer personal factors. SPAS may 
also require adaptation to the customer’s 
situation but does not test for adaptive-
ness specifically.
SPAS may conceptually overlap with the 
wider concept of adaptiveness in provid-
ing value beyond the core transaction.
Guenzi, De Luca and 
Spiro (2016)
Adaptive selling together with selling orientation are negatively 
associated with customer trust.
Walter and Ritter (2003) Adaptive supplier behaviour can lead to direct value creation (e.g. 
profit, sales volume) and/or direct value creation (e.g. innovation).
(Customer) service orientation
Hogan, Hogan and Busch 
(1984)
Application of a personality trait assessment (Hogan score) to 
adjustment, sociability, and agreeableness as major dimensions related 
to service orientation.
Service orientation may be defined 
differently depending on context, but 
generally considers positive interac-
tions between companies (and/or its 
employees) and its customers, eventu-
ally leading to customer value or as a 
personality trait.
SPAS is clearly considered as an attitude 
of salespeople rather than an organi-
zational value. SPAS may be related to 
personality but may as well be trained 
and/or shaped by experience.
Hennig-Thurau (2004) Customer orientation of service employees as a key determinant of 
customer satisfaction in service businesses.
Homburg, Hoyer and 
Fassnacht (2002)
(Value-added) services as a strategic differentiator in retail business 
strategy.
Wright, Pearce and 
Bus-bin (1997)
Customer service orientation as an implementation of the marketing 
concept is associated with operational performance.
Lytle, Hom and Mokwa 
(1998)
Development of a ten-item score of service orientation, understanding 
service orientation as a strategic organizational goal for service 
excellence

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NAŠE GOSPODARSTVO / OUR ECONOMY 68 (4) 2022 Ledinger, S.
Concept Key findings Differentiation SPAS
Service-dominant logic
Vargo and Lusch (2004) Service-dominant logic as a new paradigm in marketing, from a 
goods-centric perspective to a view focused on the value created by a 
product (or service).
Service-dominant logic primarily con-
siders the service aspect of a company’s 
core offering. SPAS acknowledges that 
buying organizations might benefit from 
a business relationship in multiple ways, 
i.e. the service provided by SPAS may be 
disconnected from the core offering.
Le Meunier-FitzHugh et 
al. (2011)
Need for salespeople to consider value in an extended context and 
extended timeframe, from co-creation of a solution until the end of the 
usage period.
Value-based selling (VBS)
Töytäri et al., 2011 Sellers need to provide proof of financial advantage provided with an 
offering. VBS demands a customer-centric sales process, focussing on 
the creation, quantification and demonstration of value. This involves 
the use of reference cases and demonstrating the price of an offering 
in relationship with the achievable monetary benefit.
VBS calls for the co-creation of value 
for the customer, but primarily focusses 
on the creation of value with the core 
offering.
SPAS has similar goals (e.g. reducing 
resistance to the salesperson’s influ-
ence attempts) and may also benefit 
from quantifying the benefit, but the 
SPAS-related benefit may be difficult to 
quantify as it is not necessarily related to 
the core offering alone. The importance 
of personality traits discussed for VBS 
may even be more important for SPAS 
than for VBS.
While VBS focusses on future value 
provided with a solution and may require 
elements of SPAS to be successful, SPAS 
focuses on a benefit achieved already in 
the process.
Liu and Zhao (2021) Development of a conceptual framework for successful VBS, including 
organi-zational and individual requirements (personality traits such 
as proactivity, motivation, ability to explore and implement new or 
improved solutions).
Terho et al. (2012) VBS as an extension of the customer value concept in marketing. VBS = 
crafting and communication of customer value based on the knowl-
edge of the buyer’s business model.
Table 1 
Theoretical framework: concepts related to SPAS, and their differentiation from SPAS (cont.)
3. Preliminary choice of the five items for the SPAS com-
ponent of the extended SOCO-SPAS score.
Results
In total, 22 out of >500 scholars (of which 5 responses by 
leading scholars, 17 by authors with previous publications on 
SOCO) have filled at least the question that rated candidate 
items as “clearly”, “somewhat” or “not” related to SPAS, for a 
total response rate of 4.2 %. In addition, several researchers, 
have provided feedback in writing. Due to the low response 
rate, complex statistical analyses e.g. to test for correlation of 
responses have not been performed. For the choice of items 
in the preliminary score, three types of ranking have been 
created:
1. A ranking of the percentage of respondents to score an 
item as “clearly” related to SPAS (with the percentage 
of respondents considering it as “somewhat” related as 
secondary criteria). With this score, the items that most 
researchers considered as clearly related with SPAS 
should be selected.
2. A point score in which an assessment as “clearly” as-
sociated accounted two points and an assessment as 
“somewhat” related with SPAS one point. With this 
measure, the total assessment of suitability is consid-
ered while strength of suitability remains considered.

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NAŠE GOSPODARSTVO / OUR ECONOMY 68 (4) 2022 Ledinger, S.
3. A ranking of items based on simple addition of re-
spondents considering the item as one of the five 
most suitable items, after subtraction of respondents 
considering the item not suitable, in order to create a 
net score.
In addition, the author considered feedback about which 
items respondents considered to correlate with other items. 
Given the low number of responses regarding correlation of 
items, the feedback must be considered anecdotal, but was 
considered relevant nonetheless.
The five selected items scored among the top 8 in either of 
the ratings and are described in Table 2 (the sorting of the 
items is in the order of the score items in the questionnaire 
sent to sales scholars).
The 15-item SOCO-SPAS score is intended for self-assessment 
by salespeople. It can be found in its entirety in Appendix 1. 
However, it is recommended that for routine use questions 
are mixed between the dimensions, or provided in random 
order if performed as an online questionnaire. 
Table A2.2 in Appendix 2 shows eight draft score items that 
have scored within the top five in at least one of the scores 
but not been used in the SOCO-SPAS score. These items may 
also be well-suited to represent SPAS, but have been excluded 
because of their overall performance (i.e. respondents have 
rated the items as slightly less relevant than those eventually 
chosen), or because respondents have considered the item as 
closely related to an item chosen for the eventual score.
Discussion
With this paper, an extension of the (revised) SOCO score 
(Thomas, Soutar and Ryan, 2001) for complex B2B sales 
situations is suggested. The criticism by Schwepker (2003) 
that SO-CO does not provide insights into what is needed 
to perform activities successfully, however, will not be solved 
by this new scoring system. However, future research might 
show that this scoring system will be more informative about 
the antecedents of selling success in the sale of complex 
solutions, primarily in business-to-business sales encounters, 
compared to the original SOCO score (Saxe & Weitz, 1982). 
The new dimension in the SOCO-SPAS score addresses factors 
that are relevant in B2B that are not sufficiently covered in 
existing scoring systems. For example, the fact that B2B sales 
cycles are typically longer than in B2C sales is considered 
by SPAS score items that refer to multiple touch points and 
communication about the value of participating in the sales 
process. The need for co-creation is acknowledged by a score 
item around the development of novel and creative solutions.
The concept of SPAS draws from several concepts that have 
received considerable attention in sales research as well as 
related areas such as service orientation. It hypothesizes 
Table 2 
Selected items for the SPAS dimension of SOCO-SPAS
% clearly 
related
Rank % 
clearly 
related
Points 
score
Rank 
points 
score
Net score 
top five
Rank - top 
five
I try to provide useful and new information to the 
customer with every contact.
77.27% 1 39 1 5 8
I enjoy working with customers to develop new 
or creative solutions.
63.64% 7 34 7 8 1
I work dilligently to fulfil any commitments made 
during the sales process, including those not 
directly related to business opportunities.
72.73% 2 38 2 6 5
I discuss the sales process as part of our offering 
and why it is of interest for the potential 
customer to participate in it.
63.64% 6 35 4 6 5
I actively seek feedback from customers, col-
leagues and superiors about how I could serve 
them better.
68.18% 4 34 6 6 4

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that (prospective) customers are more likely to engage in a 
company’s sales process, and eventually make a purchase, if 
they perceive an added value in doing so, even if eventually 
no sale comes to fruition. The concept further lends from 
content marketing where it is a key concept to attract new 
customers by providing content that is valuable, frequently 
with content that is not or only loosely related to the product 
or service offering of the company.
Several strengths and weaknesses of the present research 
need to be discussed.
Strengths
This paper improves the applicability of the SOCO scoring 
system for B2B sales. It can be assumed that such an 
extended scoring system is especially pertinent to complex 
sales situations and especially for markets where there 
is a polyphony on the supplier side (i.e. many companies 
offering a solution) as well as on the demand side. In such 
a situation, there might be a long selling cycle and, due to 
the high number of potential customers, a sales organization 
might have difficulty maintaining close relationships with 
prospects while there is only a latent demand for an offering. 
In such a situation, it might be of benefit for a supplier if 
the sales process provides value to the potential buyers, 
irrespective of the value of the core offering itself. In such 
a situation, it might be more likely for a buying organization 
to draw from the supplier’s expertise and have a relationship 
with the supplier (or even just a mere memory) when the 
need for a solution becomes current. In providing a scoring 
system with a total of 15 items, in spite of the complexity of 
B2B the questionnaire is sim-ple for salespeople to fill, and 
simple for sales leaders as well as sales researchers to work 
with and interpret.
This paper adds to the extant sales literature by providing a 
new perspective on customer orientation 40 years after the 
original publication of the SOCO score and 20 years after the 
publication of the revised score. This is well overdue, given 
how strongly the sales profession has changed in the years 
since, from technology (internet, mobile phones, videoconfer-
encing) to market structures and buyer-seller dynamics (a 
wealth of information is now readily available for buyers, 
which eliminates the need for salespeople to provide the 
most basic information to customers), profoundly changing 
the role of the salesperson as intermediary between the 
customer and the company. Although the association 
between the SPAS score and sales performance is yet to be 
established, conceptionally the newly intro-duced concept of 
SPAS may reflect attitudes required to succeed in modern-
day industrial sales, and to integrate sales and marketing 
activities for superior organizational performance.
Limitations and Future Research
The response rate of sales scholars to the questionnaire 
has been low with only some 20 responses having been 
received. The fact that all candidate items have scored >60 
% as at least somewhat related to SPAS makes statistical 
analysis difficult to perform. It is thus unclear whether all 
candidate items have been similar in their capability to 
represent SPAS, or whether a larger sample set would have 
provided clearer insights. 
As separate questionnaire links have been sent to scholars 
with different backgrounds (to citing authors, authors of key 
publication, and other sales scholars, respectively), there is a 
reason to believe that the results are balanced and thus valid. 
However, there are methodological weaknesses. First, there 
has been overlap between the groups of researchers who 
have received the questionnaire (i.e. a sales scholar may also 
be author of key publications in his/her field, and/or have 
cited such publications), which limits the value of assessing 
responses according to type of scholar. Second, the sample 
may be biased by the intentional selection of questionnaire 
recipients – although requests to participate have been sent 
to re-searchers from all continents, it may be assumed that 
the vast majority of responses might have been received 
from scholars in affluent, western countries. Extension of the 
validation to create a larger and more balanced respondent 
cohort might increase validity in an international setting. 
Third, participation links were not fully personalized nor have 
demographic questions been asked, limiting information 
about who has responded. Fourth, many respondents may 
not have correctly understood the negatively-stated items as 
such, and thus considered them “not” related to SPAS when 
they would have considered the concept relevant had it been 
formulated positively. Consequently, none of these items have 
been included in SO-CO-SPAS. However, several researchers 
have provided feedback that those statements are related to 
Selling Orientation, rather than SPAS, which suggests results 
on these items are valid. Fourth, the SOCO-SPAS score does 
not consider that different stages in a sales cycle might be 
governed by different factors or that the ideal value of SPAS 
may be situation- and customer dependent. Finally, several 
written responses suggested that there was sub-optimal 
clarity about the definition of the scoring dimension that will 
be tested. As the original questions of the revised SOCO score 
have been included in the instruction of the questionnaire, 
as well as a verbal explanation of how service orientation in 
the B2B sales process shall be defined, the author believes 
that this apparent lack of clarity is, at least in part, due to the 
novelty of the concept.
This paper confirms validity of the SPAS concept through 
feedback from sales scholars. It also enables researches and 

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NAŠE GOSPODARSTVO / OUR ECONOMY 68 (4) 2022 Ledinger, S.
practitioners alike to assess how SOCO, together with SPAS, 
mediates sales performance in complex selling situations in 
B2B sales. Nonetheless, validity needs to be further validated 
through research in actual sales settings. For example, the 
dependency of outcome on SOCO-SPAS elements could be 
tested according to stage of sales process, industry, gender, 
age, and other factors that could influence the outcome. Also, 
the SOCO-SPAS score does not explain how attitudes that 
predispose salespeople for higher performance translate into 
trainable behaviours and/or a repeatable sales process. 
Managerial Implications
As the SOCO-SPAS score or the SPAS concept have not been 
tested in actual sales settings, the managerial implications 
remain speculative. Possible benefits for sales management 
are benchmarking of a company’s sales team, identification 
of training needs, or use for the implementation of content 
marketing and customer service strategies. In addition, the 
scoring system might be used in salespeople hiring, in order 
to make sure that a new hire is naturally inclined to work 
in a way that jibes with the company’s sales, marketing, and 
customer service strategies. 
Conclusions
This paper describes the development of an extended 
version of the SOCO-SPAS Score, improving the relevance of 
the SOCO scoring system for complex B2B selling situations. 
The extended version adds a component that tests whether 
salespeople consider the sales process as a service that 
needs to add value (SPAS). The 5 items to represent the new 
SPAS dimension has been chosen following feedback from 
sales scholars on 21 candidate items. The novel score with 
15 items across three dimensions will enable researchers 
and practitioners to test which attitudes are associated 
with high sales performance. Further research is needed to 
prove the relevance of SOCO-SPAS in different settings of 
professional sales.
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Prodajni proces kot storitev (SPAS): razvoj in potrditev razširitve 
skrajšane lestvice usmerjenosti v prodajo - usmerjenost k strankam 
(SOCO) (SOCO-SPAS)
Izvleček
Povezava med prodajno usmerjenostjo in usmerjenostjo k strankam ter prodajnim uspehom je predmet intenzivnih raziskav 
vse od objave ocene prodajne usmerjenosti in usmerjenosti k strankam (SOCO) v začetku osemdesetih let prejšnjega stoletja. 
Vendar pa je še vedno težko ugotoviti katera naravnanost prodajalce predisponira k visoki uspešnosti. Poleg tega je povezava 
med usmerjenostjo k stranki lahko ukrivljena in odvisna od prodajne situacije - in malo raziskav je bilo posvečenih prodaji 
med podjetji (B2B). Namen tega prispevka je začeti zapolnjevati te vrzeli v znanju z razvojem orodja za samoocenjevanje 
stališč prodajalcev. Razširitev 10-stopenjske ocene SOCO je razvita na podlagi raziskav literature s področja prodaje/
poslovnega razvoja in usmerjenosti k storitvam v drugih okoljih. Ocena je bila naknadno potrjena s povratnimi informacijami 
strokovnjakov s področja prodaje. Razširjena ocena dodaja razsežnost, ki preverja, ali poklicni prodajalci obravnavajo prodajni 
proces kot storitev (SPAS), ki mora zagotavljati vrednost, ki presega opredelitev najboljše ponudbe. Odzivnost strokovnjakov 
s področja prodaje je bila nizka, zato je bilo treba kandidatno oceno SOCO-SPAS dodatno potrditi. Odnosi med podjetji (B2B) 
so pomembno, vendar premalo raziskano področje ekonomije. Pričujoči članek zagotavlja sredstvo za oceno razmerja med 
stališči in uspešnostjo prodaje v sodobni prodaji B2B z razširitvijo sistema točkovanja, ki je bil prvotno razvit za prodajo B2C 
in več let nazaj, ko so bile tržne razmere drugačne kot danes.
Ključne besede: prodajni process, prodaja B2B, usmerjenost k strankam, usmerjenost k storitvam, samoocenjevanje

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NAŠE GOSPODARSTVO / OUR ECONOMY 68 (4) 2022 Ledinger, S.
Appendix 1 : Dimensions of the SOCO-SPAS Questionnaire
The statements below describe ways a salesperson might act with customers (for convenience, the word "customer" is used 
to refer to both customers and prospects). For each statement, please indicate the proportion of your customers with whom 
you act as described in the statement. The meanings of the numbers are:
1 - True for NONE of your customers-NEVER
2 - True for ALMOST NONE . . .
3 - True for A FEW . . .
4 - True for SOMEWHAT LESS THAN HALF . . .
5 - True for ABOUT HALF . . 
6 - True for SOMEWHAT MORE THAN HALF . . .
7 - True for a LARGE MAJORITY ...
8 - True for ALMOST ALL ...
9 - True for ALL of your customers-ALWAYS
For example, if you choose 6 below, you indicate that you enjoy developing solutions with your customers in somewhat more 
than half of the time.
Never Always
I enjoy working with customers to develop new or creative solutions. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
Customer Orientation Never Always
I try to figure out what customer needs are. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
A good employee has to have the customer’s best interest in mind. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
I try to bring a customer with a problem together with a  
product/service that helps solve that problem.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
I offer the product/service that is best suited to the customer’s problem. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
I try to find out what kind of products/services will be  
most helpful to a customer.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
Selling Orientation Never Always
I try to sell as much as I can rather than to satisfy a customer. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
It is necessary to stretch the truth in describing a product to a customer. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
I try to sell a customer all I can convince them to buy,  
even if I think it is more than a wise customer would buy.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
I try to find out what kind of products/services will be  
most helpful to a customer.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
I paint too rosy a picture of my product/service to  
make them sound as good as possible.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
I decide what product/service to offer on the basis of what I can convince 
customers to accept, not on the basis of what will  
satisfy them in the long run.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

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Sales Process as a Service (SPAS) Orientation) Never Always
I try to provide useful and new information to the  
customer with every contact.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
I enjoy working with customers to develop new or creative solutions. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
I try to provide a better customer experience than the  
customer will reasonably expect.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
I discuss benefits of working with my company beyond the  
solutions that my company sells.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
I actively seek feedback from customers, colleagues and  
superiors about how I could serve them better.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

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NAŠE GOSPODARSTVO / OUR ECONOMY 68 (4) 2022 Ledinger, S.
Appendix 2: Candidate Items for the SPAS Component
Table A2.1 
The 21 candidate items for the SPAS dimension. Items with (-): reverse scaled items
Potential item for the SPAS dimension
I try to help the customers also in areas where my company’s 
solutions can’t.
I enjoy working with customers to develop new or creative 
solutions.
I want to be perceived as an industry expert and let customers 
draw from my broad expertise.
During the sales process, I always think of how to reach my 
goals and company sales goals. (-)
I will do my customer a favor only if I am confident that it will 
pay off in the short term. (-)
The primary goal in my interaction with the customer is to 
uncover needs. (-)
I try to engage with the customer only as long as it takes to 
find information required to make the sale. (-)
I try to provide useful and new information to the customer 
with every contact.
I work diligently to fulfil any commitments made during the 
sales process, including those not directly related to business 
opportunities.
I work diligently to fulfil any commitments made during the 
sales process, including those not directly related to business 
opportunities.
I feel like the sales process has a greater influence on the 
customer decision than the objective fit of the solution.
I discuss the sales process as part of our offering and why it is 
of interest for the potential customer to participate in it.
I try to provide a better customer experience than the 
customer will reasonably expect.
I try to understand the customer’s situation as thoroughly as 
possible.
I discuss benefits of working with my company beyond the 
solutions that my company sells.
I try to create an atmosphere where customers can be trustful 
enough to talk about any topic on their mind.
I show my customers that I care for them even when I am 
busy.
I try to make interactions as convenient for the client as 
possible.
I actively seek feedback from customers, colleagues and 
superiors about how I could serve them better.
I acknowledge and appreciate that the customer needs to 
contribute to a fruitful sales process.
I am keen on learning and applying new competencies in the 
sales process.

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NAŠE GOSPODARSTVO / OUR ECONOMY 68 (4) 2022 Ledinger, S.
Table A2.2
Items to score in top 10 in either ranking, not chosen for final score
Potential item for the SPAS 
dimension 
% clearly 
related
Rank % 
clearly 
related
Points 
score
Rank 
points 
score
Net score 
top five
Rank - 
top five
Reason to  
not pick
I try to help the customers also 
in areas where my company’s 
solutions can’t.
59.09% 12 33 12 7 3 Performance
I want to be perceived as an 
industry expert and let customers 
draw from my broad expertise.
63.64% 7 34 7 4 11 Performance
I try to provide a better customer 
experience than the customer will 
reasonably expect.
59.09% 13 32 13 8 2 Performance
I show my customers that I care for 
them even when I am busy.
68.18% 3 35 4 2 16 Corr. item 12
I acknowledge and appreciate that 
the customer needs to contribute 
to a fruitful sales process.
63.64% 5 36 3 5 9 Corr. item 3
I discuss benefits of working with 
my company beyond the solutions 
that my company sells.
63.64% 9 33 10 5 9 Performance
I try to make interactions as con-
venient for the client as possible.
59.09% 11 34 9 3 14 Performance
I am keen on learning and applying 
new competencies in the sales 
process
63.64 % 9 33 10 6 5 Performance