Tag Archives: technology

  • The Wireless Industry’s Killer ‘B’

    Shankar_ODriscoll_Reibstein_S+B_2003

    by Venkatesh Shankar, Tony O’Driscoll, and David Reibstein

    This article was published in Strategy+Business, 31 (Summer 2003), 68-77.

    We suggest a strategic approach and offer examples of firms successfully using m-business can provide an understanding how mobile technology will impact a firm’s business model and organization. An understanding of where monies are being spent in m-business in the industry as well as in complementary and competitive industries may be valuable as mobile technology’s core value proposition of anything, anywhere, anytime is hacking at the root of the industry-segmented mental model. The future opportunity for m-business truly lies in the cross-industry context rather than within the context of any given industry. Cultivation of the capability to recognize and act upon cross-industry value networks aimed at constantly enhancing customer value may the hallmark of successful firms in the wireless world. While firms need to grab the low-hanging fruits of wireless now, they also should look at changing the ways of doing business in the future mobile environment characterized by cross-industry coordinated value bundles for customers.

  • Online and Mobile Advertising: Current Scenario, Emerging Trends, and Future Directions

    Shankar_Hollinger_MSl_2007

    by Venkatesh Shankar and Marie Hollinger

    This article was published as MSI Report 07-206.

    Online advertising expenditures are growing rapidly and are expected to reach $37 billion in the U.S. by 2011. Mobile advertising or advertising delivered through mobile devices or media is also growing substantially. Advertisers need to better understand the different forms, formats, and media associated with online and mobile advertising, how such advertising influences consumer behavior, the different pricing models for such advertising, and how to formulate a strategy for effectively allocating their marketing dollars to different online advertising forms, formats and media. In this article, we address these issues. We provide an overview of the current scenario with regard to online and mobile advertising. We discuss the emerging trends in these areas and offer our view of the future directions.

  • Mobile Marketing in the Retailing Environment: Current Insights and Future Research Avenues

    Shankar Venkatesh Hofacker Naik JIM 2010

    by Venkatesh Shankar, Alladi Venkatesh, Charles Hofacker, and Prasad Naik

    This article was published in the Journal of Interactive Marketing, 24 (2010), 111-120.

    Mobile marketing, which involves two- or multi-way communication and promotion of an offer between a firm and its customers using the mobile, a term that refers to the mobile medium, device, channel, or technology, is growing in importance in the retailing environment. It has the potential to change the paradigm of retailing from one based on consumers entering the retailing environment to retailers entering the consumer’s environment through anytime, anywhere mobile devices. We propose a conceptual framework that comprises three key entities, the consumer, the mobile, and the retailer. The framework addresses key related issues such as mobile consumer activities, mobile consumer segments, mobile adoption enablers and inhibitors, key mobile properties, key retailer mobile marketing activities and competition. We also address successful retailer mobile marketing strategies, identify the customer-related and organizational challenges on this topic, and outline future research scenarios and avenues related to these issues.

  • Mobile Marketing: A Synthesis and Prognosis

    Shankar Balasubramanian JIM 2009

    by Venkatesh Shankar and Sridhar Balasubramanian

    This article was published in the Journal of Interactive Marketing, 23 (2009), 118-129.

    Mobile marketing refers to the two- or multi-way communication and promotion of an offer between a firm and its customers using a mobile medium, device, or technology.  We present the conceptual underpinnings of mobile marketing and a synthesis of the relevant literature. We identify and discuss four key issues: drivers of mobile device/service adoption, the influence of mobile marketing on customer decision-making, formulation of a mobile marketing strategy, and mobile marketing in the global context.  We outline research directions related to these issues and conclude by delineating the managerial implications of mobile marketing insights.

  • On the Efficiency of Internet Markets for Consumer Goods

    Ratchford_Pan_Shankar_JPPM_2003

    Brian T. Rachford, Xing Pan, and Venkatesh Shankar

    This article was published in Journal of Public Policy and Marketing, 22 (Spring 2003), 4-16.

    Despite claims that electronic commerce lowers search costs dramatically, and therefore makes it easy for consumers to spot the best buy, empirical studies have found a substantial degree of price dispersion in electronic markets for consumer goods. This study investigates the consumer welfare implications of observed price levels and price dispersion in electronic markets. We examine the consumer welfare implications of changes in the structure of electronic commerce markets employing comprehensive data sets on e-tailer prices and services collected from BizRate.com in November 2000 and 2001. We find that price dispersion decreased substantially between these two periods, and that measured differences in e-tailer services bear little relation to e-tailer prices.

  • Price Dispersion on the Internet: A Review and Directions for Future Research

    Pan_Ratchford_Shankar_JIM_2004

    by Xing Pan, Brian T. Ratchford, and Venkatesh Shankar

    This aricle was published in the Journal of Interactive Marketing, 18 (Autumn 2004), 116-135.

    The explosive growth in Internet retailing has sparked a stream of research on online price dispersion, defined as the distribution of prices (such as range and standard deviation) of an item with the same measured characteristics across sellers of the item at a given point in time.  In this paper, we review the empirical and analytical literatures on online price dispersion and outline the future directions in this research stream.  We address the issue of whether price dispersion is greater or smaller online than offline, examine whether price dispersion on the Internet has changed over time, discuss multi-channel retailing and measurement of price dispersion, explore why Internet price dispersion exists, and investigate the drivers of online price dispersion.

     

  • Can Price Dispersion in Online Markets be Explained by Differences in E-Tailer Service Quality?

    Pan_Ratchford_Shankar_JAMS_2002

    by Xing Pan, Brian T. Ratchford, and Venkaesh Shankar

    This article was published in the Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 30 (Fall 2002), 433-445.

    It has been hypothesized that the online medium and the Internet lower search costs and that electronic markets are more competitive than conventional markets.  This suggests that price dispersion–the distribution of prices of an item indicated by measures such as range and standard deviation—of an item with the same measured characteristics across sellers of the item at a given point in time for identical products sold by e-tailers online (on the Internet) should be smaller than it is offline, but some recent empirical evidence reveals the opposite.  A study by Smith et al. (2000) speculates that this is due to heterogeneity among e-tailers in such factors as shopping convenience and consumer awareness.  Based on an empirical analysis of 105 e-tailers comprising 6739 price observations for 581 items in eight product categories, we show that online price dispersion is persistent, even after controlling for e-tailer heterogeneity.  Our general conclusion is that the proportion of the price dispersion explained by e-tailer characteristics is small. This evidence is contrary to the hypothesis that search costs in online markets are low, or that online markets are highly competitive.  The results also show that after controlling for differences in e-tailer service quality, prices at pure play e-tailers are equal to or lower than those at bricks-and-clicks e-tailers for all categories except books and computer software.

     

  • Asymmetric New Product Development Alliances: Win-Win or Win-Lose Partnerships?

    Kalaignanam_Shankar_Varadarajan_ MgtS_2007

    by Karthik Kalaignanam, Venkatesh Shankar, and Rajan Varadarajan

    This article was published in Management Science, 53 (March, 2007), 357-374.

    Inter-organizational alliances are widely recognized as critical to product innovation, particularly in high technology markets. Many new product development (NPD) alliances tend to be asymmetric, that is, they are formed between a larger firm and a smaller firm. As is the case with alliances in general, asymmetric alliances also typically result in changes in the shareholder values of the partner firms. Are the changes in shareholder values of partner firms significant? Are asymmetric NPD alliances win-win or win-lose partnerships? Are the gains or losses symmetric for the larger and smaller partner firms? What factors drive the changes in shareholder values of the partner firms? These important questions remain largely unexplored as evidenced by the dearth of empirical research on the effect of asymmetric NPD alliances on shareholder value and on the apportionment of this value between the partner firms. We develop and empirically test a model of short-term changes in shareholder values of larger and smaller firms involved in NPD alliances, using the event study methodology on data covering 167 asymmetric alliances in the information technology and communication industries. In this model, we examine alliance, firm, and partner characteristics as potential determinants of the changes in shareholder values of the partner firms due to a NPD alliance announcement. Our model accounts for selection correction, potential cross-correlation across the residuals from the models of firm value changes for the larger and smaller firms, and unobserved heterogeneity. The results suggest that both the partners experience significant short-term financial gains, but there are considerable asymmetries between the larger and smaller firms with regard to the effects of alliance, partner and firm characteristics on the gains of the partner firms. The results relating to alliance characteristics suggest that while a broad scope alliance enhances the financial gains for the larger firm, a scale R&D alliance (relative to a link alliance) contributes positively to the financial gains for the smaller firm. With regard to partner characteristics, while partner alliance experience positively influences the financial gains for the larger firm, it has no significant effect on the financial returns for the smaller firm. Further, partner innovativeness is positively associated with the financial gains for the larger firm, but partner reputation is unrelated to the financial gains of the smaller firm. As regard firm characteristics, the magnitude of the financial gains accruing from a firm’s own alliance experience is considerably higher for the smaller firm than it is for the larger firm. We outline the implications of the research findings for future research and management practice.

  • Digital Business Strategy

    This course is designed to give you a good understanding of strategic digital business thinking for start-ups and bricks and mortar corporations (bricks and clicks businesses). It will cover digital business strategy formulation and implementation of programs to meet with the needs of the customers, while achieving the business objectives. The focus will be on understanding of the basic digital business concepts and frameworks and application of the concepts in the form of case analysis, discussion of real-world examples, and development and presentation of digital business ideas and plans. The course will emphasize the following key elements: 1. Strategic analysis of digital business opportunities: Issues of focal concern include analysis of the e-business space including markets, business models, company, competitors and customers, segmentation analysis, target segment selection, and product positioning. 2. Digital business steps: The important elements include digital business vision, digital strategy, digital business model, marketing, and organization in the digital environment. 3. Digital business plan: This includes the process of writing and presenting a business plan for a digital business venture. It involves your team coming up with a digital business idea or concept, writing and presenting a detailed business plan based on that concept. The course will also highlight special topics in marketing such as B2B, B2C and wireless in the form of cases and several industry examples. An innovative feature of this intensive course is a presentation of your business plan summary to venture capitalist(s) and to other digital business experts and an ability to receive feedback from them.

    Digital Business Strategy SYLLABUS Winter 2003