Sellers
Owners’ Willingness to Accept in the Sharing Economy
Gretchen Ross, Eunice Kim & Margaret Meloy
Journal of Marketing, forthcoming
Abstract:
The sharing economy has become an increasingly widespread way for peers to rent out their owned goods to others seeking to rent them. This research investigates how providers (i.e., owners renting out their belongings) decide what price to charge, and identifies the provider WTA effect, where in the context of a peer-to-peer (P2P) collaborative consumption model, providers are willing to accept (WTA) less than renters (i.e., non-owners) are willing to pay (WTP). These findings diverge from prior research which has repeatedly demonstrated that owners typically demand more to part with their belongings than non-owners are willing to pay in a seller/buyer transaction (i.e., the endowment effect). The provider WTA effect is explained by providers having a more accessible empathy lens which in turn acts to dampen the accessibility of their exchange lens when renting out their item. This drives WTA below WTP. The effect is moderated when the renter is identified as a dissimilar transaction partner. This research provides actionable implications for providers and platforms.
The Misfit Bias
Bryan Stroube, Keyvan Vakili & Michaël Bikard
Organization Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
Consumers and other audiences often penalize products that combine unrelated elements. In this paper, we document the consequences of that penalty for the evaluation of the elements being combined. Building on the idea that audiences cannot fully disentangle the quality of “fit” between elements from the quality of the elements individually, we argue that audiences are likely to direct their dislike of a misfit product to the individual elements being combined. Using an archival study of the music industry and an online experiment with photographic galleries, we find that evaluations of individual elements (songs, photographs) are influenced by product-level fit (albums, galleries). Elements of misfit products are evaluated less favorably than they would have been otherwise. Moreover, this bias is exacerbated when the evaluation of the whole product is emphasized. We discuss the implications of this “misfit bias” for the innovation, entrepreneurship, and categories literatures.
How Much Influencer Marketing Is Undisclosed? Evidence from Twitter
Daniel Ershov, Yanting He & Stephan Seiler
Marketing Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
We study the disclosure of influencer posts on Twitter across a large set of brands based on a unique data set of over 100 million posts and a novel classification method to detect undisclosed sponsorship. Using our preferred empirical specification, we find that 96% of sponsored posts are not disclosed. This result is robust to a series of specification tests, and even a lower-bound classification still yields an undisclosed share of 82%. Despite stronger enforcement of disclosure regulations, the share of undisclosed posts decreases only slightly over time. Compared with disclosed posts, undisclosed posts tend to be associated with young brands with a large Twitter following. Using an online survey, we find that many consumers are not able to identify sponsored content without disclosure. Our findings highlight a potential need for further regulatory scrutiny and suggest that researchers studying influencers must account for undisclosed sponsored content.
How Good is AI at Twisting Arms? Experiments in Debt Collection
James Choi et al.
Yale Working Paper, March 2025
Abstract:
How good is AI at persuading humans to perform costly actions? We study calls made to get delinquent consumer borrowers to repay. Regression discontinuity and a randomized experiment reveal that AI is substantially less effective than human callers. Replacing AI with humans six days into delinquency closes much of the gap. But borrowers initially contacted by AI have repaid 1% less of the initial late payment one year later and are more likely to miss subsequent payments than borrowers who were always called by humans. AI’s lesser ability to extract promises that feel binding may contribute to the performance gap.
Does Sponsored Search Advertising Augment Organic Search? Evidence from an E-Commerce Platform
Sarah Moshary
Management Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
This paper provides empirical evidence on the performance of sponsored search advertising in a case study of an unnamed e-commerce platform. I leverage a field experiment that blocks all sponsored search advertising for 3% of site visitors. The experiment shows that sponsored search advertising both steals business from organic listings and also reduces the total volume of transactions intermediated by the platform. However, in this case study, I find that sponsored search is nonetheless profitable for the platform because ad revenue more than compensates for the reduction in commissions that the platform earns on transactions.