Uncertainty in Prerelease Advertising

Firms frequently advertise products and services before they are launched. Yet how to best design such advertisements is not well understood. The current article investigates how consumers respond to uncertainty in prerelease advertisements. Across five studies, including both field and lab studies, we first provide evidence for the positive effect of uncertain prerelease advertisements using real consumer behavior on Facebook and YouTube and at the box office. Next, we uncover the mechanism underlying this effect (i.e., inflated outcome expectancies), outline a managerially relevant boundary condition (i.e., the positive effect reverses when a preorder opportunity is offered), and demonstrate that the effect of uncertainty on consumer response differs in prerelease versus postrelease advertisements depending on consumers’ perceived risk. Finally, we discuss implications for marketing research as well as for the design of prerelease advertisements for stimulating prerelease buzz and word of mouth.     

CAP Reforms in the 1990s and their Price and Welfare Implications: The Case of Wheat

We use a nonlinear commodity market model to assess, theoretically and empirically, the impacts of recent reforms of the CAP on prices and economic welfare in the EU. The empirical analysis is based on an aggregate structural econometric model of the EU wheat economy and its links to the rest of the world. Instability issues are also investigated. Impacts of CAP reforms on the variance of domestic and world prices are analysed and a Monte Carlo simulation is used to evaluate uncertainty in the model's welfare computations. Recent reforms led to a net welfare gain within the EU during the period 1993–2000. Additional budgetary costs are less than the welfare gains of consumers and producers. Producers gained as lower price support was overcompensated by additional direct payments.     

Tacit meaning in disguise: Hidden metaphors in new product development and market making

This article explores the role of metaphor in product development processes and market making. Based on a sociocognitive perspective of innovation dynamics and required learning by market actors, the potential of metaphors for mental model development during new product development (NPD) processes is investigated. Three roles for metaphors as cognitive focusing devices for the co-evolution of producers' and consumers' mental models are inferred: mental model communication, mental model matching, and mental model creation. These roles are illustrated by examples that reinforce the need for creativity in applying metaphors as cognitive focusing devices in NPD and market making.