IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/inm/orstsc/v7y2022i4p267-283.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Manufacturing Popularity: An Ecological Model of Time-Based Competition

Author

Listed:
  • William P. Barnett

    (Stanford Graduate School of Business, Stanford, California 94305)

  • Mooweon Rhee

    (School of Business, Yonsei University, Seodaemun-gu, Seoul 03722, Korea)

  • Elise Tak

    (Google, Mountain View, California 94043)

Abstract

Many markets are characterized by the rapid coming and going of successive products, each lasting in the market for only a short period of time before it is replaced by another. Such markets confront firms with the strategic challenge of trying to enhance the success and longevity of their products. We develop a model to understand such time-based competition among products and how it is shaped by different organizational strategies. We estimate the model using data on Korean popular music. The results highlight the importance of social exposure to a transitory product’s chances of becoming and remaining popular. They also show that efforts by large organizations to manufacture popularity in that context have triggered a self-defeating dynamic. These efforts not only improve the competitiveness of songs trying to become popular but also increase competition from rival songs, thereby intensifying the brevity of success.

Suggested Citation

  • William P. Barnett & Mooweon Rhee & Elise Tak, 2022. "Manufacturing Popularity: An Ecological Model of Time-Based Competition," Strategy Science, INFORMS, vol. 7(4), pages 267-283, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:inm:orstsc:v:7:y:2022:i:4:p:267-283
    DOI: 10.1287/stsc.2022.0157
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1287/stsc.2022.0157
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1287/stsc.2022.0157?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:inm:orstsc:v:7:y:2022:i:4:p:267-283. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Asher (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/inforea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.