Marketing Faculty Research

Gamification and Mobile Marketing Effectiveness

Posted on by Nancy White

Journal of Interactive Marketing 34 (2016), 25–36

Charles F. Hofacker, Ko de Ruyter, Nicholas H. Lurie, Puneet Manchanda, & Jeff Donaldson

A variety of business sectors have been buffeted by the diffusion of mobile technology, a trend that presents a variety of difficult challenges but interesting opportunities to marketers. One such opportunity is gamification, which, one hopes, will enhance appeal to mobile consumers. Our sense from both personal experience and the literature is that the gamified mobile apps currently offered by firms mostly miss the mark. We provide a systematic overview of game design and note how principles derived from that field are highly applicable to gamification in mobile marketing settings. We are aided by the work of Schell (2008), whose Elemental Game Tetrad Model allows us to offer a coherent look at how gamification should affect mobile marketing outcomes.  Full article.

Drivers of Local Relative to Global Brand Purchases: A Contingency Approach.

Posted on by Nancy White

Journal of International Marketing (2015), 23 (1), 1-22.

Yuliya Strizhakova and Robin A. Coulter

As globalization has ensued, consumers around the world are increasingly making choices between global brands (sold under the same name in multiple countries around the world), and local brands (sold under a given name in one country or local region). Historically, local brands, particularly in emerging markets, were viewed as low quality and unappealing, but with the increased prevalence of global brands, local brands have become more competitive alternatives that signal originality, local cultural connections, pride and prestige. Notably, local brands are steadily gaining market share in India, China, Russia, and Brazil.Continue Reading

On the Brink: Predicting Business Failure with Mobile Location-based Checkins.

Posted on by Nancy White

Decision Support Systems, 2015.

Joseph Pancras (Marketing). Co-authors: Ram Gopal (OPIM), Ramesh Shankar (OPIM), Lei Wang (Penn State University)

Consumers are increasingly using mobile services for engaging with firms in the offline world both directly through purchases and loyalty points redemptions, and indirectly through mobile gamification portals related to the retail outlet. One major such portal is Foursquare, the location-based service provider, which has been gaining popularity in the last few years. Continue Reading

Managing Customer Acquisition Risk Using Co-operative Databases.

Posted on by Nancy White

Journal of Interactive Marketing, Volume 29, February 2015, Pages 39-56.

Authors: Hongju Liu and Joseph Pancras (Marketing). Co-author: Malcolm Houtz (Alliant Inc)

Firms typically have detailed information only about their own customers. In order to gain a broader view of customers across firms, several firms may pool their data together and engage an intermediary called a co-operative database firm to manage and analyze the pooled data to provide better targeting solutions for the firms. In this paper Professors Liu and Pancras study these interesting intermediaries by developing a framework for firms to manage customer acquisition risk using co-operative databases.Continue Reading

Investigating the Impact of Customer Stochasticity on Firm Price Discrimination Strategies using a New Bayesian Mixture Scale Heterogeneity Model

Posted on by Nancy White

Marketing Letters, 2015, 1-16.

Joseph Pancras (Marketing) and Dipak K. Dey (Statistics) Co-author: Xia Wang (University of Cincinnati)

Targeted marketing is increasingly popular among new media firms and accurate targeting requires well-calibrated statistical models which will identify customer preferences from their previous historical transactions so as to customize an offering to their needs. A typical example of such targeted marketing is customized pricing, where a price sensitive customer is given a coupon with a higher face value, while a less price sensitive or brand loyal customer may be given a lower face value or no coupon at all. Continue Reading

An Empirical Model of Drug Detailing: Dynamic Competition and Policy Implications

Posted on by Nancy White

Management Science, forthcoming

Hongju Liu. Co-authors: Qiang Liu, Sachin Gupta, and Sriram Venkataraman

Although the pharmaceutical industry is mainly driven by innovation, it spends an enormous amount of money on marketing. Among various marketing vehicles, detailing – personal selling through representatives – accounts for the single largest expenditure. The vast amount of detailing spending in the pharmaceutical industry has drawn the attention of the public and of policy makers. As a result, the practice of detailing in the marketing of prescription drugs is undergoing significant changes. Continue Reading

How Competitor Brand Names Affect Within-Brand Choices

Posted on by Nancy White

Marketing Letters (forthcoming)

Kunter Gunasti and Berna Devezer

In a recent research forthcoming at Marketing Letters, Dr. Gunasti and his co-author show that consumer choices among different models of a brand name can be affected by exposure to a competitor brand name that forms an incidental trend with the numbers in the focal brand names. For instance, a consumer shopping for a Mercedes and trying to choose between a Mercedes C330 vs. C340 can be exposed to a competitor brand such as a BMW 320i, which increases the chances that he will leave the store with the higher number focal brand Mercedes C340. Although the competitor brand is not even available to choose and it is not considered, its mere presence seems to affect consumers’ focal choices.Continue Reading