Segmentation: Identification, intuition, and implementation

This paper concerns the implementation of segmentation within a business-to-business organisation. There is wide agreement that segmentation is a fundamental component of marketing strategy. Numerous methods are identified, but there is little guidance on how segmentation can be applied in practice. Four barriers to implementation are identified. The notion of intuition has been applied in the segmentation of emerging markets for technologically based products. This work is extended into established markets using an inductive methodology and adopts an action learning approach to incorporate managerial experience into the process, illustrated by a case study. Several opportunities for further research arise.     

国内市场分割与中国的出口贸易扩张

本文将国内市场分割和边际成本与固定成本之间的反向关系引入Melitz(2003)的模型,构建了一个开放经济模型。文章证明了国内市场分割导致不同生产技术的企业都首选进入国外市场。这似乎解释了中国出口贸易的强劲增长其实是严重的国内市场分割导致企业无法依托巨大的国内需求、发挥规模经济而被迫出口的扭曲现象。     

Baby boomers turning grey: European profiles

Globally, the senior or “grey” tourism segment is of increasing importance, reflecting a richer aging population with good health and a desire to travel. Though this niche is traditionally described as homogeneous, grey tourism comprises different subgroups. Identifying the profiles, preferences, and behaviors of these subgroups has become an important task for organizations competing to satisfy tourist demands. This study classifies the factors that most influence mature travelers' decisions. Using a database of 3458 respondents from 35 European countries, four new grey tourism market subgroups were identified. These were named “explorers”, “livewires”, “vacationers”, and “homebodies”, to reflect different preferences and behaviors. The implications for destination marketing and management are also discussed.     

Consumer heterogeneity in the longer-term effects of price promotions

While a significant literature has emerged recently on the longer-term effects of price promotions, as inferred from persistence models, there is very little if any attention paid to whether such longer-term effects vary across different types of consumers. This paper takes a first step in that direction by exploring whether the adjustment, permanent, and total effects of price promotions, and the duration of the adjustment period, differ between consumers segmented based on their usage rates in a product category and their loyalty to a brand. We also investigate whether such consumer segmentation will improve the forecasting performance of persistence models at both product category and brand levels. Expectations are developed based on consumer behavior theory on various effects of price promotions, such as the post-deal trough, the mere purchase effect, the promotion usage effect, and responsiveness to competitor's reactions. Evidence from household-level supermarket scanner data on four product categories is provided. We find substantial differences between consumer segments and provide insights on how managers can increase the longer-term effectiveness of price promotions by targeting each consumer segment with a different promotion program. In addition, consumer segmentation is found to significantly improve the forecasting performance of the persistence model for two of the four product categories. For the other two product categories, consumer segmentation provides forecasting performance similar to that obtained from aggregate-level persistence models.     

不同所有制企业的工资决定机制考察

本文通过1989—1997年教育回报率在不同所有制间的差异及其变化来考察中国的劳动力市场。利用CHNS数据分别估计国有企业、大型集体企业、小型集体企业以及私营企业的工资方程,结果表明教育回报率在民营部门增加得较为明显,在其他部门则没有增加的迹象。1997年,民营部门教育回报率明显高于其他部门,样本选择只能解释其中一部分差异,这表明民营经济工资决定机制与其他部门不同。     

The role of fashionability in second-hand shopping motivations

Second-hand consumption has been quietly undergoing a makeover in recent years. As part of this shift, the concept of shopping for second-hand goods has been redefined. In today's retail marketplace, a mix of thrift stores, high-end stores, and online retailers are recognising the value of second-hand and hosting flea markets or launching their own vintage product collections. However, limited research attention has been paid to role of ‘fashionability’ as a motivation for consumers to shop for second-hand goods. In this study, we explore modern consumer second-hand shopping behaviour and motivations, inclusive of fashionability. Through a segmentation of second-hand store shoppers, we identify four distinct segments. While we find a polarisation of fashionability motivations, the vast majority (83%) of second-hand shoppers are driven by fashion when shopping in second-hand stores. The findings present several implications for second-hand retailers, including new ways to expand their customer base by tapping into elements of fashionability.     

Revisiting the substantiality criterion: From ethnic marketing to market segmentation

This paper examines the meaning and application of the concept of substantiality for consumer market segmentation and target selection with a focus on ethnicity and minority ethnic groups. In contrast with interpretations of segment substance anchoring on some sufficient potential size to justify time and effort involved in planning, the objective is to consider key group dimensions to ascertain potential substantiality. Common criteria proposed to assess substance are essentially an exhortation to assess the value of the segmenting opportunity. An increase in producer surplus meets this requirement but this consideration is done post hoc. The challenge for market segmentation is to assess substantiality a priori. This paper presents a screening approach based on appraising minority ethnic group resources that enables such an assessment and has potential applicability to other consumer subcultures.     

Retention of latent segments in regression-based marketing models

Product design and marketing mix decisions for segmented markets depend crucially on the correct specification of marketing models used as input to these decisions. With real-world data, the true number of segments in a market is unknown. Current evidence from simulation studies suggests that the accuracy of commonly used criteria for determining the number of segments in a market depends on the usage context, including the type of distribution being used to describe the data, the model specification, and the characteristics of the market. This study investigates via simulation the performance of seven segment retention criteria used with finite mixture regression models for normal data. This is one of the most important analysis contexts in marketing research since regression models are used, for example, in conjoint analysis and market response analysis, yet no previous study in either the marketing or statistics literatures explores the segment retention problem for mixture regression models. The study shows that one criterion, Akaike's Information Criterion (AIC) with a per-parameter penalty factor of 3 (AIC3), is clearly the best criterion to use across a wide variety of model specifications and data configurations, having the highest success rate and producing very low parameter bias. Currently, this criterion is rarely, if ever, used in the marketing literature.     

American depositary receipts: An analysis of international stock price movements

With significant increases in private capital flows across the globe, there has been a rise in the US listing of foreign stocks as American depositary receipts (ADRs). In this study, we employ cointegration techniques and estimate error-correction (EC) models to examine the degree of integration between US and three foreign equity markets. We find that ADRs are cointegrated with ordinary shares trading in the UK, Japan, and Germany, which implies that for long-term investors, they are a substitute for ordinary shares. Our analysis of the dynamic relationships between ADRs and foreign equities suggest that both markets contribute information pertinent to portfolio valuation. However, the foreign markets are found to be the more important source of information.     

中国制造业企业承接外包生产与自主创新

随着国际生产分工的日益深化以及制造业外包的蓬勃发展,承接外包生产已经成为中国制造业企业参与国际生产,融入全球生产分工体系的主要途径之一.而制造业外包承接活动为提升企业自主创新能力提供了重要的平台和促进机制.在竞争压力下的企业外包(再分包)行为的双向促进机制可以促进企业学习能力的提升,并经过产业集群效应、行业知识外溢和扩散作用及政策支持予以放大.但这一促进作用也存在一定的局限性,对于突破性技术、管理创新尤其如此.因此,现阶段中国制造业较宜采取外包推动下的自主创新模式.