Implementing price increases in turbulent economies: Pricing approaches for reducing perceptions of price unfairness

Consumer frustration over having less money in their pockets and, at the same time facing higher prices for products and services in the marketplace, arises during turbulent economic times (e.g., post-2007). Sellers suffer increased costs and pass along increases by raising prices to consumers. The current article discusses trends in the pricing literature and in practice that sellers utilize in limiting perceptions of price unfairness, particularly when increasing price in turbulent economic times. Specifically, engaging in transparency in pricing by revealing information about price changes to the consumer during poor economic times potentially reduces perceptions of price unfairness. Using industry-common price-setting practices, shrinking product volume, providing automatic rebates promotions, or offering price-matching promotions also likely reduces perceptions of price unfairness.     

Creating and detecting fake reviews of online products

Customers increasingly rely on reviews for product information. However, the usefulness of online reviews is impeded by fake reviews that give an untruthful picture of product quality. Therefore, detection of fake reviews is needed. Unfortunately, so far, automatic detection has only had partial success in this challenging task. In this research, we address the creation and detection of fake reviews. First, we experiment with two language models, ULMFiT and GPT-2, to generate fake product reviews based on an Amazon e-commerce dataset. Using the better model, GPT-2, we create a dataset for a classification task of fake review detection. We show that a machine classifier can accomplish this goal near-perfectly, whereas human raters exhibit significantly lower accuracy and agreement than the tested algorithms. The model was also effective on detected human generated fake reviews. The results imply that, while fake review detection is challenging for humans, “machines can fight machines” in the task of detecting fake reviews. Our findings have implications for consumer protection, defense of firms from unfair competition, and responsibility of review platforms.     

Online shoppers in Australia: dealing with problems

Although the Internet is a convenient platform to conduct commercial transactions, consumers are disadvantaged in the online marketplace due to insufficient information about goods and services as well as business and transaction process, lack of access to redress and several other problems. The number of complaints regarding online transactions increased in Australia from 2001 to 2005, and the number of Internet‐fraud related complaints reported to Consumer Sentinel (USA ) also increased from 2003 to 2006. This, in turn, has undermined consumer trust and impeded the growth of e‐retailing as well as added to the fear among e‐consumers of falling prey to online fraud. In spite of this, the nature and effectiveness of e‐consumer protection has not been adequately studied, notwithstanding extensive research into other aspects of e‐retailing. This article examines (i) the level of awareness of the respondents in the survey in Australia of the current policy framework for addressing consumer protection about online shopping in terms of redress; and (ii) the behaviour of the two groups of respondents in this survey who have and have not encountered problems with online purchases. The findings suggest that most respondents are not aware of the following issues, namely (i) which organizations are involved in e‐consumer protection; (ii) government regulations and guidelines; (iii) industry codes of conduct; (iv) self‐regulatory approaches adopted by business; and (v) the activities of consumer associations to protect consumers in the online marketplace. The findings also show that most respondents would seek redress if they were unhappy with their online purchases and if they knew how to proceed, and that most of them would settle disputes directly with e‐retailers. Also, online shoppers who had encountered problems were more likely to continue purchasing via the Internet than online shoppers who had not encountered any problems. This suggests that respondents find that the benefits offered by e‐retailing outweigh the risks associated with it.     

Addressing privacy predicaments in the digital marketplace: A power‐relations perspective

The utilization and governance of the internet and adjacent disruptive technologies have created numerous challenges to ensuring consumer online privacy. This study employs the power–responsibility equilibrium theory to explore emerging online privacy issues in the data‐driven marketplace. This exploratory study, based on semi‐structured interviews, explains why online shopping consumers are increasingly worried about their privacy and why they behave in a manner that could be detrimental to the consumer–vendor relationship. The findings suggest that deficiencies of corporate privacy responsibility and regulatory protection have deprived consumers of privacy empowerment. These deficiencies have also accentuated perceived privacy contract violations to trigger privacy concerns and subsequent defensive responses. We identify enhancement of consumer privacy empowerment and assuagement of privacy contract violations as two separate mechanisms of addressing online privacy issues. We also highlight the importance of addressing power and responsibility dynamics for maintaining a healthy information‐exchange environment.     

Comparing consumer-produced product reviews across multiple websites with sentiment classification

ABSTRACT

Online consumer reviews have been extensively studied. However, existing literature analyzing online consumer review data mostly relies on a single data source, resulting in potentially biased analytics conclusions. Many websites encourage consumers to post reviews of their purchased products, so that new consumers can evaluate these reviews for the same product across different websites to help them make purchasing decisions. Confusions often arise in this process, because there often exist substantial discrepancies in customer reviews across different retailers on the same product. Clarifying such confusions can help consumers reduce concerns to make up their mind for their purchases, therefore benefiting both consumers and retailers. Through text analytics and sentiment analysis, we comparatively examine the underlying patterns of online consumer reviews of three large retailers including Sears, Home Depot, and Best Buy for a same product. Afterward, we combine online consumer reviews from these large retailers and conduct an overall text analytics and sentiment analysis. The overall results are further compared with the results from individual retailers. The findings show that the sentiment of the online consumer reviews could vary substantially so relying on a single data source to make purchase decision is not a wise idea. Based on the results, we further devise a framework to comparatively examine and integrate multiple data sources for social media analytics of online consumer reviews. This study offers important managerial implications and identifies several new research directions for social media analytics.     

The Role of Brand Communications in Consumer Purchases of Organic Foods: A Research Framework

Despite a high level of awareness about organic foods in the marketplace, consumer purchases remain relatively low. This article develops a research framework for translation of relatively high consumer awareness of organic foods to increased consumer purchases. Literature review reveals that both a lack of knowledge in how foods qualify as organic and consumers’ mistrust in the way organizations apply the word organic prevents consumers from engaging in organic food purchases. Furthermore, being organic is no longer enough as organic products have become commoditized in the marketplace. With such an increasing commoditization of organic products, there is a growing pressure for organics to more effectively differentiate themselves. Accordingly, there is a dual branding opportunity for upgrading the current state of consumer awareness into both a higher volume of purchases and expanding the consumer base. This article proposes a research framework utilizing brand communications that could play a central role in triggering higher levels of consumer awareness, translating into increased volumes of organic purchases. This research framework considers consumer benefits an antecedent to brand communications and organic knowledge and consumer trust the mediators in influencing consumer organic purchases.     

Content analysis of fake consumer reviews by survey-based text categorization

As the influence of online consumer reviews grows, deceptive reviews are a worsening problem, betraying consumers' trust in reviews by pretending to be authentic and informative. This research identifies factors that can separate deceptive reviews from genuine ones. First, we create a novel means of detection by contrasting authentic versus fake word patterns specific to a given domain (e.g., hotel services). We use a survey on a crowdsourcing platform to obtain both genuine and deceptive reviews of hotels. We learned the word patterns from each category to discriminate genuine reviews from fake ones for positively and negatively evaluated reviews, respectively. We show that our All Terms procedure outperforms current benchmark methods in computational linguistics and marketing. Our extended analysis reveals the factors that determine fake reviews (e.g., a lack of details, present- and future-time orientation, and emotional exaggeration) and the factors influencing people's willingness to write fake reviews (including social media trust, product quality consciousness, deal proneness, hedonic and utilitarian consumption, prosocial behavior, and individualism). We also use our procedure to analyze more than 250,000 real-world hotel reviews to detect fake reviews and identify the hotel and review characteristics influencing review fakery in the industry (e.g., star rating, franchise hotel, hotel size, room price, review timing, and review rating).     

什么样的评论更可信？心理模拟视角下在线评论类型对感知在线评论可信性的影响研究

在线评论及其可信性已成为消费者网购决策重要的依据。以往研究多关注在线评论自身属性对在线评论可信性的影响,忽视了消费者心理认知的作用。文章从消费者心理角度,结合爬虫数据和实验研究发现,消费者对搜索品属性型评论感知可信性更高,对体验品体验型评论感知可信性更高;心理模拟在感知在线评论可信性影响过程中具有中介作用,搜索品属性型评论通过结果模拟引发更高的感知评论可信性,体验品体验型评论则通过过程模拟引发更高的感知评论可信性。研究结论对网络购物平台及商家制定更精准的营销策略和评论管理机制有帮助。     

When does electronic word-of-mouth matter? A study of consumer product reviews

Online consumer product reviews, a form of electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM), have attracted increased attention from researchers. This paper examines the persuasiveness of eWOM. Drawing on regulatory focus theory, the authors propose that the consumption goals that consumers associate with the reviewed product moderate the effect of review valence on persuasiveness. Data from lab experiments and actual online retailers suggest that consumers who evaluate products associated with promotion consumption goals perceive positive reviews to be more persuasive than negative ones (i.e., a positivity bias). Conversely, consumers who evaluate products associated with prevention consumption goals perceive negative reviews to be more persuasive than positive ones (i.e., a negativity bias).     

Unveiling user-generated content: Designing websites to best present customer reviews

Online customer reviews are an important type of user-generated content, through which consumers share their experiences with products and services in order to help others make informed purchasing decisions. In this article, we discuss the goals of online customer reviews and develop practical, actionable principles that can be used to improve the presentations of customer reviews. We identify four goals—two ultimate, and two intermediate—of online customer reviews. The two ultimate goals are: (1) to assist consumers in making accurate choices, and (2) to reduce the cognitive costs of making such choices. The two intermediate goals are: (1) to help consumers form an unbiased understanding of the product, and (2) to construct a set of evaluative criteria. Drawing on the constructive view of consumer judgment and choice, we present a conceptual model of online-review based consumer judgment and choice. We report principles that will improve the presentation of reviews, and discuss the benefits of the new design over the traditional presentation of online reviews.     

The Recent versus The Out-Dated: An Experimental Examination of the Time-Variant Effects of Online Consumer Reviews

Conventional wisdom suggests that the most recent online reviews may have a greater impact than out-dated online reviews on consumers’ purchase decisions because of their up-to-date nature. However, building on the theory of temporal distance and construal fit, this study proposes a new perspective, suggesting that the influence of online reviews posted at different times is a function of the timeframe for the consumers’ intended purchase. Four experiments demonstrate that although recent online reviews are more influential in shifting consumer preferences towards near-future consumption decisions, the relative influence of out-dated online reviews in shifting consumer preferences increases when consumers are making distant-future consumption decisions. This effect occurs because of a construal fit between the construal level of the online reviews posted at different times and that of the timeframe of consumers’ purchase decisions. The recent reviews are represented at a relatively lower construal level, with the low-level construal matching the timeframe of the near-future consumption decision. Out-dated reviews, however, are represented at a relatively higher construal level and match the timeframe of the distant-future consumption decision. This construal fit, in turn, enhances consumer engagement and consequently exerts a greater influence on consumer preferences.     

Consumer Protection in Cyber Space and the Ethics of Stewardship

This paper explores how consumer protection is evolving in the information-communications technology (ICT) sector. Traditionally, consumer protection law regimes are vertical in design and somewhat paternalistic in attitude. Requirements are imposed by governmental agencies on providers of goods and services with a view to protecting consumers. In many cases, consumers are not actively engaged by regulatory regimes in their own protection and may not be able to contract out of provisions designed for their protection. In the context of internet-based activities, however, a paradigm shift is necessary to protect not only the individual consumer but the wider network of consumers using the internet. This paper explores what consumer protection should look like in our hyper-connected, online world. Its central argument is that a new sort of model is necessary for consumer protection in the ICT sector. In the context of internet-based activities, regulators must engage consumers on a horizontal level as co-stewards of the internet. This involves more than just education about the risks of malware and online scams. The consumer protection framework must draw consumers into its structure as proactive agents working collaboratively with government, internet service providers, and other stakeholders to promote cyber security.     

Dilution and Negation of Consumer Information by Antifactual Content: Proposals for Solutions

Following identification and analysis of antifactual content and the tendency of information researchers and regulators to ignore it, this article continues the discussion by presenting proposals to incorporate the concept into research and public policy on the quantity and quality of marketplace information available to consumers. Proposals are offered for information researchers, for regulators and policymakers such as the FTC, for advertisers, and for consumers and consumer advocates.     

Children as Vulnerable Consumers in Online Environments

Children are seen as vulnerable consumers, yet little research has considered why they are more vulnerable than adults in an online context. This conceptual article uses an ecological paradigm to explore the underlying mechanisms that bring about vulnerability for children in general and specifically when interacting with online marketer created material. It does this by using the definition of a vulnerable consumer outlined by Baker, Gentry, and Rittenburg to focus on how marketing influence creates power imbalance, hinders consumption goals, and affects personal and social perceptions of self, leading children to be vulnerable consumers in online contexts. A social ecological conceptual framework is presented that demonstrates the interdependence of children's vulnerability with the social structure of their environments. Finally, in discussing how marketers are ultimately the agents in control of creating a fair marketplace for children online, policy implications are given.     

Online users' attitudes toward fake news: Implications for brand management

This study examines brands' vulnerability to fake news. The rapid spread of online misinformation poses challenges to brand managers, whose brands are cocreated online, sometimes to the detriment of the brand. There is a need to identify the information sources that are likely to be trustworthy and to promote positive consumer attitudes toward brands. The data for this study were taken from a Flash Eurobarometer of 26,576 respondents across 28 European countries. Cluster analysis and partial least squares structural equation modeling were used to analyze the data and unveil users' attitudes toward fake news. The findings show that users' attitudes toward fake news differ among European countries. Younger and tech-savvy users are more likely to recognize fake news and are consequently able to evaluate digital information sources without relying on policy interventions to limit the impact of fake news. Brand managers can use the findings of this study to better understand different kinds of users' susceptibility to fake news and reshape their social media branding strategies accordingly. It is hoped that this paper will encourage further research on brand management in relation to fake news and promote the widespread adoption of best practices in social media communication.     

Consumer demand for counterfeit goods

Research on counterfeiting has focused on the supply side, with scant attention to consumer demand for counterfeit goods. Anticounterfeiting efforts would benefit from the identification of the segment(s) of consumer counterfeiting accomplices, consumers who knowingly purchase counterfeit products. This article reports on three studies, conducted at flea markets and malls, that attempted to identify consumer accomplices. Study 1 investigated prepurchase factors, Study 2 focused on factors active during purchasing, and Study 3 concentrated on postpurchase factors. The results suggest the existence of a typology of consumer accomplices, sly shoppers who purposely purchase counterfeit goods to demonstrate their consumer shrewdness and economically concerned shoppers whose intentional purchase of fake goods is driven by economic concerns. Implications for marketing practitioners are discussed. © 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

Measuring the impact of online reviews on consumer purchase decisions – A scale development study

Consumers' exposure to online reviews influences their online retail shopping behavior. They search for reviews while evaluating products for purchase decisions. Past studies have indicated that online reviews affect the credibility and trust of the sellers and the products they sell on online platforms. Keeping this in view, the current paper aims to develop and validate a scale to understand the impact of online reviews on consumer purchase decisions. Data were collected from 431 young online shoppers for this research. The initial exploratory factor analysis (EFA) results helped identify four factors, viz. source credibility, volume, language and comprehension, and relevance which constitute the scale. The scale was validated by confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). The study's findings fill the gap of having a standardized scale that online retailers can use as indicators to assist consumers in their online decision-making. The discussions and implications support consumers' susceptibility to online reviews, an essential source for product and brand information in facilitating online consumers' purchase decisions.     

Too Popular to Ignore: The Influence of Online Reviews on Purchase Intentions of Search and Experience Products

Consumers assess the credibility of online product reviews to guide their purchase decisions. However, little is known about how consumers determine the credibility of online product reviews. This article examines the effect of the level of detail in a product review and the level of reviewer agreement with it on the credibility of a review and consumers' purchase intentions for search and experience products. Overall, the results indicate that more credible reviews lead to higher purchase intentions. Interestingly, the findings also demonstrate that consumers determine the credibility of a review differently for search and experience products. For search products, consumers deem online reviews to be more credible when the reviews contain detailed information about the product. However, for experience products, consumers determine the credibility of a review by assessing the level of reviewer agreement with a review. The lack of diagnosticity of detailed information in online reviews of experience products is attributed to the idiosyncratic nature of experiences. Implications for research and practice are discussed.     

Delight the experts,but never dissatisfy your customers! A multi-category study on the effects of online review source on intention to buy a new product

Online reviews are a pervasive form of electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM) that potentially accelerate—or slow down—the diffusion of recently launched services in the marketplace. While empirical research largely supports the effects of online reviews on attitudinal and behavioral outcomes, less is known about the impact the source of the review—i.e., if it comes from a peer consumer or an expert—has on the recipient. Two experiments that combine reviewer- (expert, consumer), service type- (mobile package, restaurant, car repair), consumer- (level of general innovativeness), and review-related (positive, negative) characteristics reveal a challenging interaction between the review’s source and its valence: while—compared to an established baseline—a positive expert review seems more effective in increasing the recipient's intention to purchase than a review by a peer consumer, a negative consumer review lowers the recipient's intentions to a larger extent than a negative expert review. We further find effects of the consumer's innovativeness and the service category across the experiments. Our research contributes to the topical and increasing body of empirical research on the effects of involved characteristics within online reviews across several product types.     

Young consumers in the digital era: The selfie effect

This article investigates a mechanism named the selfie effect. By their frequent sharing of selfies on social media, perhaps displaying their cool new fashions or newly acquired tattoos, young people—unintentionally—help providers to promote their products and services, and thereby contribute to the commercial pressure. The existence of a selfie effect builds on hypotheses originating from a pilot interview study concerning how young adults master the consumer role. In this article, the existence of a selfie effect is investigated in a nationally representative web survey with 1,707 respondents aged 16–60, living in Norway. While 59% of the teenagers said they were posting selfies weekly or more often, only 2% among those in their fifties did. The multivariate quantitative analyses support the idea that teenagers and young adults, frequently online, become vulnerable in the consumer role. Particularly posting selfies and following bloggers increase consumer detriment and overconsumption.