Chris Nelson
Associate Professor of Marketing
Department: Marketing & International Business
Email: cnelson34@elon.edu
Phone number: (336) 278-6105
Brief Biography
Christopher A. Nelson is an Associate Professor of Marketing and Director of the Chandler Family Professional Sales Center at Elon University. He holds a Ph.D. in Marketing from West Virginia University. Chris’ research interests are in relational selling dynamics and sales technology. His research has been published in high-quality journals such as Industrial Marketing Management, Journal of Personal Selling and Sales Management, European Journal of Marketing, Journal of International Marketing, and Journal of Business and Industrial Marketing. He worked in professional sales and marketing research before entering academia.
Chris’ focus is on using the knowledge gained from scholarship and practitioner experience as the foundation of his teaching. He teaches classes on the topics of professional selling, sales management, sales technology, and marketing research. He enjoys mentoring and coaching students and currently holds the Love Faculty Excellence Fellowship for his work in this area. Chris’ research, teaching, and professional experience compliment Elon's strength as a top university in professional sales education.
News & Notes
Education
Master of Marketing Research, Southern Illinois University Edwardsville, 2009
B.S., Marketing, Gardner-Webb University, 2004
Courses Taught
MKT 4140: Marketing Research
MKT 4190: Sales Management
MKT 4200: Customer Relationship Management (CRM)
Leadership Positions
Publications
Cui, Annie, Christopher A. Nelson, Xinchun Wang, and Shuili Du (2025) "The Effect of Renqing Repair on Trust Recovery: A Cross-culture Study,” Journal of International Marketing
Nelson, Christopher A. and James R. Brown (2024) “Actions Speak Louder than Words: The Adaptive Use of Present Focused and Future Focused Behavior on Trust Recovery,” Industrial Marketing Management
Nelson, Christopher A., Annie Peng Cui, and Xinchun Wang (2024) “More is better but in what direction? The effects of relationship marketing investment breadth and depth on customer gratitude,” Industrial Marketing Management
Bauer, Carlos, John M. Galvan, Tyler Hancock, Gary K. Hunter, Christopher A. Nelson, Jennifer Riley, and Emily Tanner (2024) “Integration of technology with the sales-service ecosystem: The emergent Sales Techno-Ecosystem,” European Journal of Marketing
Nelson, Christopher A., Michael Walsh, and Annie Peng Cui (2023), “Trust Repair After a Sales Manager Error,” Journal of Personal Selling and Sales Management
Tomlinson, Edward, Christopher A. Nelson, and Luke Langlinais (2021), “Cognitive Processes in Trust Repair,” International Journal of Conflict Management.
Nelson, Christopher A., Annie Peng Cui, and Michael F. Walsh (2021), "Breach of Trust and Repair: The Impact of Salesperson Words and Actions on Buyer Trust," Qualitative Market Research: an International Journal.
Nelson, Christopher A. and Michael F. Walsh (2021) “The Role of Salesperson Implicit Mindset in Organizational Commitment,” Journal of Selling
Nelson, Christopher A., Michael F. Walsh, and Annie Peng Cui (2020), “The Role of Analytical CRM on Salesperson Use of Competitive Intelligence,” Journal of Business and Industrial Marketing.
Cui, Annie, Christopher A. Nelson, and Alexis Yim (2020), "Global Luxury Brands: Researching Cross Cultural Differences in Motivations to Consume" in Handbook of Cross-Cultural Marketing Research, Edward Elgar Publishing
Presentations
Nelson, Christopher A., Gary Hunter, and Lana Waschka “Inbound Sales Management: Exploring The Substitutability of Autonomous AI Sales Agents in Advancing B2B Relationships” [Runner Up for Best Paper Award] The effects of relationship marketing investment breadth and depth on customer gratitude, 1st Industrial Marketing Management South American Summit, Brazil
Nelson, Christopher A., AI-Enabled Role Play Feedback and Practice, Sales Educators Academy (June 2024)
Nelson, Christopher A. and Timothy Norvell, Proactive Salesperson Relationship Recovery, Academy of Marketing Science, Florida (May 2024)
Peng, Annie Cui, Christopher A. Nelson, and Xinchun Wang (February 2023), “A Cross-Cultural Examination of Trust Recovery: A Salesperson’s Use of Renqing Repair Strategy” AMA Winter Educators’ Conference, Nashville, TN
Nelson, Christopher A., Annie Peng Cui, and Xinchun Wang (January 2023), The effects of relationship marketing investment breadth and depth on customer gratitude, 6th Industrial Marketing Management Summit, Virtual.
Nelson, Christopher A., Michael Walsh, and Annie Peng Cui (February 2022), Trust Repair After A Sales Manager Error, AMA Winter Educators’ Conference, Las Vegas, NV
Nelson, Christopher A., Michael Walsh, and Annie Peng Cui (November 2020), “It Will Not Happen Again.” Repairing Trust after a Sales Manager Error,” Society for Marketing Advances, Virtual
Nelson, Christopher A. and James Brown (2019), “Trust Repair in the Buyer-Seller Relationship,” National Conference in Sales Management, Jacksonville, FL
Tomlinson, Edward, Christopher A. Nelson, and Luke Langlinais (2019), “Cognitive Processes in Trust Repair,” FINT Conference, St. Gallen, Switzerland
McFarland, Richard G., and Christopher A. Nelson (2016), “Trust Recovery in Buyer-Seller Relationships,” EMAC, Oslo, Norway
McFarland, Richard G., and Christopher A. Nelson (2015), “Exploring the Neural Basis of Trust Formation in Marketing,” AMA Winter Educators’ Conference, San Antonio, TX
Nelson, Christopher A. (2015), “The Role of Trust and Information Value on Salesperson Competitive Intelligence” National Conference in Sales Management [Best Doctoral Student Paper], Houston, TX
Nelson, Christopher A. (2015), “Examining the Effectiveness of a Trust Repair Strategy following a Breach of Trust” National Conference in Sales Management, Houston, TX
Nelson, Christopher A., and Richard G. McFarland (2015), “Developing a Model of Trust Repair and Breach of Trust in the Buyer-Seller Dyad” Sales Force Productivity Conference, Atlanta, GA
Awards
2025, Dean's Award for Excellence in Scholarship
2024, IMM Summit Runner Up for Best Paper Award
2023-2025, Love Faculty Excellence Fellowship
2023, Elon Center for the Advancement of Teaching and Learning Grant
2022, Sales Researchers’ Collaboration Consortium (SRCC) Fellow
2021, Elon University Sustainability Faculty Scholar
2018, First Runner Up for the 2018 AMA Sales SIG Doctoral Dissertation Award
2018, Journal of Consumer Research Author Development Workshop (one of fifteen accepted proposals worldwide)
2015, National Conference in Sales Management Doctoral Fellow
2015, National Conference in Sales Management Best Doctoral Student Paper Award
2015, Full Merit Based Scholarship to the ISBM Seminar Series Class on Personal Selling