CRM (Customer Relationship Management) and trust: Global trends in scientific production
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.61347/psa.v3i3.120Keywords:
Bibliometric analysis, Customer Relationship Management, machine learning, social CRM, trustAbstract
Customer Relationship Management (CRM) has become a strategic pillar of contemporary business management, enabling the building of long-term relationships based on trust between organizations and their clients. Over the past decade, digitalization, big data, artificial intelligence (AI), and omnichannel strategies have transformed the scope and complexity of CRM, making trust a critical factor for relational sustainability. This study presents a comprehensive bibliometric analysis of the scientific literature indexed in Scopus (2000–2024) on the relationship between CRM and trust, based on a corpus of 43 peer-reviewed articles, complemented by recent research published in high-impact journals. The tools Bibliometrix (R) and VOSviewer were used to map production indicators (temporal evolution, countries, and institutions), impact (most cited articles and authors, journals, and SJR quartiles), and intellectual structure (co-citation and co-occurrence). The results reveal a steady growth in academic production since the mid-2010s, with a clear predominance of driving themes related to data analytics, social CRM, applied AI, and omnichannel strategies, which serve as vectors of innovation in the field. Trust emerges as a central axis linking personalization, automation, and behavioral outcomes (loyalty, satisfaction, and retention), while also raising new challenges concerning data privacy, algorithmic explainability, and digital governance.
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