IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/mktlet/v32y2021i4d10.1007_s11002-021-09567-7.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Taking marketing strategy risks with seemingly no expected gains

Author

Listed:
  • Yuanfang Lin

    (University of Guelph)

  • Amit Pazgal

    (Rice University)

Abstract

This paper investigates the competitive rationale for firms to invest in marketing activities aiming to enhance valuation and achieve differentiation and competitive advantage, while carrying the strategic risks of causing unintended negative consequences. We build a stylized theoretical model where firms offering similar (homogenous) products are competing by determining their marketing strategy and pricing. Each firm must choose between several marketing activities that have different potentials of enhancing consumers’ product valuations while carrying some risk of lowering consumer valuation if unintended negative outcomes occur. The stochastic nature of marketing implies that (1) even when both firms invest the same amount of money aiming to enhance product valuations by the same level, there will be a variety of (posterior) vertical differentiation scenarios where the consumers could value either firm’s product as better as or worse than the rival’s. (2) The firms may employ marketing activities that do not even lead to gains in consumer product valuation in expectation. The duopoly model analysis indicates that associated with strategic pricing, even such stochastic marketing activities may constitute desirable strategies for two a priori symmetric firms in order to avoid a Bertrand type competition as the benefit from differentiation is found to be significant enough to offset the unintended negative outcomes. The oligopoly model analysis indicates that there is an increased incentive to take marketing risk when there is a greater level of competitive intensity in the marketplace. Preliminary experimental evidence is presented to support the main findings from theoretical model analyses. The paper thus provides important managerial implications for firms contemplating investment in seemingly risky marketing activities.

Suggested Citation

  • Yuanfang Lin & Amit Pazgal, 2021. "Taking marketing strategy risks with seemingly no expected gains," Marketing Letters, Springer, vol. 32(4), pages 363-377, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:mktlet:v:32:y:2021:i:4:d:10.1007_s11002-021-09567-7
    DOI: 10.1007/s11002-021-09567-7
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11002-021-09567-7
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s11002-021-09567-7?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
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. John R. Hauser & Steven M. Shugan, 2008. "Defensive Marketing Strategies," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 27(1), pages 88-110, 01-02.
    2. Brander, James A. & Spencer, Barbara J., 2015. "Intra-industry trade with Bertrand and Cournot oligopoly: The role of endogenous horizontal product differentiation," Research in Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(2), pages 157-165.
    3. Alexei Alexandrov, 2015. "When Should Firms Expose Themselves to Risk?," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 61(12), pages 3001-3008, December.
    4. Victor Tremblay & Stephen Polasky, 2002. "Advertising with Subjective Horizontal and Vertical Product Differentiation," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 20(3), pages 253-265, May.
    5. K. Sridhar Moorthy, 1988. "Product and Price Competition in a Duopoly," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 7(2), pages 141-168.
    6. Preyas S. Desai, 2001. "Quality Segmentation in Spatial Markets: When Does Cannibalization Affect Product Line Design?," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 20(3), pages 265-283, August.
    7. Mas-Colell, Andreu & Whinston, Michael D. & Green, Jerry R., 1995. "Microeconomic Theory," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780195102680.
    8. Stanley F. Slater & Eric M. Olson, 2001. "Marketing's contribution to the implementation of business strategy: an empirical analysis," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 22(11), pages 1055-1067, November.
    9. Gerard R. Butters, 1977. "Equilibrium Distributions of Sales and Advertising Prices," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 44(3), pages 465-491.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. A. Yeşim Orhun & Sriram Venkataraman & Pradeep K. Chintagunta, 2016. "Impact of Competition on Product Decisions: Movie Choices of Exhibitors," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 35(1), pages 73-92, January.
    2. Dmitri Kuksov & Yuanfang Lin, 2010. "Information Provision in a Vertically Differentiated Competitive Marketplace," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 29(1), pages 122-138, 01-02.
    3. Bing Jing, 2006. "On the Profitability of Firms in a Differentiated Industry," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 25(3), pages 248-259, 05-06.
    4. Jonathan D. Bohlmann & Peter N. Golder & Debanjan Mitra, 2002. "Deconstructing the Pioneer's Advantage: Examining Vintage Effects and Consumer Valuations of Quality and Variety," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 48(9), pages 1175-1195, September.
    5. Lin Yuanfang & Narasimhan Chakravarthi, 2020. "Persuasive Advertising in a Vertically Differentiated Competitive Marketplace," Review of Marketing Science, De Gruyter, vol. 18(1), pages 145-177, September.
    6. Yogesh V. Joshi & David J. Reibstein & Z. John Zhang, 2016. "Turf Wars: Product Line Strategies in Competitive Markets," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 35(1), pages 128-141, January.
    7. Raphael Thomadsen, 2007. "Product Positioning and Competition: The Role of Location in the Fast Food Industry," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 26(6), pages 792-804, 11-12.
    8. Dmitri Kuksov & Yuanfang Lin, 2017. "Signaling Low Margin Through Assortment," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 63(4), pages 1166-1183, April.
    9. T. Tony Ke & Jiwoong Shin & Jungju Yu, 2023. "A Model of Product Portfolio Design: Guiding Consumer Search Through Brand Positioning," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 42(6), pages 1101-1124, November.
    10. Yunchuan Liu & Tony Haitao Cui, 2010. "The Length of Product Line in Distribution Channels," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 29(3), pages 474-482, 05-06.
    11. Ajay Kalra & Surendra Rajiv & Kannan Srinivasan, 1998. "Response to Competitive Entry: A Rationale for Delayed Defensive Reaction," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 17(4), pages 380-405.
    12. Delre, Sebastiano A. & Panico, Claudio & Wierenga, Berend, 2017. "Competitive strategies in the motion picture industry: An ABM to study investment decisions," International Journal of Research in Marketing, Elsevier, vol. 34(1), pages 69-99.
    13. Ayd{i}n Alptekinou{g}lu & Charles J. Corbett, 2008. "Mass Customization vs. Mass Production: Variety and Price Competition," Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, INFORMS, vol. 10(2), pages 204-217, August.
    14. Anderson, Simon & Baik, Alicia & Larson, Nathan, 2015. "Personalized pricing and advertising: An asymmetric equilibrium analysis," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 92(C), pages 53-73.
    15. Luo, Zheng & Chen, Xu & Chen, Jing & Wang, Xiaojun, 2017. "Optimal pricing policies for differentiated brands under different supply chain power structures," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 259(2), pages 437-451.
    16. Yuanfang Lin & Sandeep Krishnamurthy, 2017. "Generic and Brand Advertising Strategies Under Inter-Industry Competition," Customer Needs and Solutions, Springer;Institute for Sustainable Innovation and Growth (iSIG), vol. 4(1), pages 18-27, September.
    17. Neil A. Morgan & Kimberly A. Whitler & Hui Feng & Simos Chari, 2019. "Research in marketing strategy," Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Springer, vol. 47(1), pages 4-29, January.
    18. V Kumar & Amalesh Sharma & Shaphali Gupta, 2017. "Accessing the influence of strategic marketing research on generating impact: moderating roles of models, journals, and estimation approaches," Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Springer, vol. 45(2), pages 164-185, March.
    19. Liu, Yan & Shi, Hongyan & Petruzzi, Nicholas C., 2018. "Optimal quality and quantity provisions for centralized vs. decentralized distribution: Market size uncertainty effects," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 265(3), pages 1144-1158.
    20. MATHUR Sameer & DEWANI Prem Prakash, 2015. "Market Entry, Product Quality And Price Competition," Studies in Business and Economics, Lucian Blaga University of Sibiu, Faculty of Economic Sciences, vol. 10(2), pages 62-82, August.

    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:kap:mktlet:v:32:y:2021:i:4:d:10.1007_s11002-021-09567-7. 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.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with 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: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    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.