Consumer Inattention, Uncertainty, and Marketing Strategy

Consumer Inattention, Uncertainty, and Marketing Strategy
Author: Xinyu Cao
Publisher:
Total Pages: 210
Release: 2018
Genre:
ISBN:

This dissertation investigates the implications of consumer inattention and uncertainty for firms' advertising and pricing decisions. The first chapter is an overview of the problems addressed in the dissertation and the main findings. The second chapter develops a theory-based, cost-effective method to estimate the demand for new products using choice experiments. The premise is that consumers are uncertain about their valuation of a new product and need to spend costly effort to learn their valuation. The effort consumers spend is affected by the probability of their choice being realized, and as a result will change the manifested demand curve derived from choice experiments. We run a large-scale choice experiment on a mobile game platform, where we randomize the price and realization probability of a new product. Data support our theoretical hypothesis. We then estimate a structural model of consumer decisions. The structural estimates allow us to accurately infer actual demand based on choice experiments of small to moderate realization probabilities. The third chapter examines firms' advertising strategy on social media under consumers' limited attention. Advertising on social media faces a new challenge as consumers can actively select which advertisers to follow. A Bayesian learning model suggests that consumers with limited attention may rationally choose to unfollow a firm. This happens if consumers already know about the firm's value well and if the firm advertises too intensely. However, we find that intensive advertising may still be the optimal strategy for firms. If a firm is perceived as providing low value, it will want to advertise aggressively to change consumers' mind; if a firm is perceived as providing higher value, it will also want to advertise intensively, but in an effort to crowd-out advertising messages from its competitors. Tracking company accounts of 49 TV shows on the most popular tweeting website in China provides empirical evidence that both popular and non-popular firms advertise intensively, although the number of followers does go down when a firm advertises too intensively. The fourth chapter investigates channel coordination in search advertising. Given that consumers have limited attention, there are only a limited number of advertising slots on search engine platforms that can attract positive number of clicks. A manufacturer can sponsor retailers to advertise its products while at the same time compete with them in a position auction with limited number of slots. We prescribe the optimal cooperative search advertising strategies for the manufacturer. We find that it may not be optimal for a manufacturer to cooperate with all of its retailers, even when these retailers are ex ante the same. This finding reflects the manufacturer's tradeoff between higher demand and higher bidding cost caused by more intensified competition. With two asymmetric retailers, the manufacturer should support the retailer with the higher channel profit per click to get a higher position than the other retailer. The manufacturer should take a higher position than a retailer when its profit per click via direct sales exceeds the channel profit per click of the retailer. We also investigate how a manufacturer uses both wholesale and advertising contracts to coordinate channels with endogenous retail prices.

Consumer Inattention and Firm Behavior

Consumer Inattention and Firm Behavior
Author: Andreas Kraft (Ph. D.)
Publisher:
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2023
Genre:
ISBN:

Lack of information distorts markets, and communicating product value to potential consumers is a crucial ingredient of marketing strategy. However, a large body of behavioral research has suggested that even when information is easily accessible, consumers often fail to attend to it. Evidence of consumer inattention has been studied in various settings, both inside and outside the laboratory. How an intermediary should react when communication fails as a result of consumers’ failure to use the provided information is unclear. Can or should firms profit from asymmetric information caused by consumer inattention? If so, by how much? Does competition alleviate the effect? We consider these questions in the context of resale markets, both theoretically and empirically. The theoretical model demonstrates that a centralized intermediary can extract surplus from serving consumers who are less attentive and, as a result, overestimate the product value. We test the theory using a detailed dataset of millions of automobile transactions from a seven-year period. First, we find clear evidence of a specific type of inattention: Buyers exhibit left-digit bias and systematically underestimate the depreciation of vehicles that have odometer readings immediately below round cutoffs. Second, the estimated level of inattention is twice as high in dealership transactions than in consumer transactions, so that dealers make a significantly higher margin on such vehicles. Third, we estimate the supply-side response to consumer inattention and find 2.53% additional transactions, compared to the no-inattention counterfactual. As a result, the average margin is 1.8% higher, leading to an aggregate increase in operating profits of 4.37%, or about $422 million, within the seven-year sample period. The surplus obtained by the product owners who sell in the market increases by about 2.77%. Back-of-the-envelope calculations imply that U.S. used vehicle dealers’ annual profits attributable to consumer inattention are about $700 million

Competing for Consumer Inattention

Competing for Consumer Inattention
Author: Geoffroy de Clippel
Publisher:
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2013
Genre: Attention
ISBN:

Consumers purchase multiple types of goods and services, but may be able to examine only a limited number of markets for the best price. We propose a simple model which captures these features, conveying some new insights. A firm's price can deflect or draw attention to its market, and consequently, limited attention introduces a new dimension of competition across markets. We fully characterize the resulting equilibrium, and show that the presence of partially attentive consumers improves consumer welfare as a whole. When consumers are less attentive, they are more likely to miss the best offer in each market; but the enhanced cross-market competition decreases average price paid, as leading firms try to stay under the consumers' radar.

Understanding Consumer Decision Making

Understanding Consumer Decision Making
Author: Thomas J. Reynolds
Publisher: Psychology Press
Total Pages: 463
Release: 2001-05
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1135693161

This edited volume will help business and academic researchers understand the means-end approach to understanding consumers. This is a qualitative marketing research method to gain customer insight into decision making.

Consumer Behavior

Consumer Behavior
Author: David Mothersbaugh
Publisher:
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2023
Genre: Consumer behavior
ISBN: 9781266479328

Handbook of the Economics of Marketing

Handbook of the Economics of Marketing
Author:
Publisher: Elsevier
Total Pages: 632
Release: 2019-09-19
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0444637656

Handbook of the Economics of Marketing, Volume One: Marketing and Economics mixes empirical work in industrial organization with quantitative marketing tools, presenting tactics that help researchers tackle problems with a balance of intuition and skepticism. It offers critical perspectives on theoretical work within economics, delivering a comprehensive, critical, up-to-date, and accessible review of the field that has always been missing. This literature summary of research at the intersection of economics and marketing is written by, and for, economists, and the book's authors share a belief in analytical and integrated approaches to marketing, emphasizing data-driven, result-oriented, pragmatic strategies. Helps academic and non-academic economists understand recent, rapid changes in the economics of marketing Designed for economists already convinced of the benefits of applying economics tools to marketing Written for those who wish to become quickly acquainted with the integration of marketing and economics

Consumer Behavior

Consumer Behavior
Author: Del I. Hawkins
Publisher: McGraw-Hill/Irwin
Total Pages: 649
Release: 1995
Genre: Consumer behavior
ISBN: 9780256165470

Consumer Behaviour

Consumer Behaviour
Author: Cathy M. Neal
Publisher:
Total Pages: 668
Release: 2004
Genre: Consumer behavior
ISBN: 9780071242738