Download or read book Reputation Information Signals and Willingness to Pay for Heterogeneous Goods in Online Auctions written by Mikhail Ion Melnik and published by . This book was released on 2014 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In online commerce, a buyer cannot directly examine the product and has to rely heavily on the reliability of the seller. In this setting, the reputation of the seller, together with any other information signals on the quality of the product, can play an important role in determining the buyer's willingness to pay for the good. However, while the impact of reputation on willingness to pay for homogeneous goods has been examined, its impact on heterogeneous goods is largely unknown. This paper examines the effects of the seller's reputation and information signals in online auctions, using U.S. silver Morgan dollar coins in almost uncirculated condition that are sold on eBay. The empirical results indicate that a seller's overall reputation has a positive and statistically significant impact on a buyer's willingness to pay in online auctions, an impact that is larger than for homogeneous goods. The results also indicate that negative comments about a seller have larger, and negative, impact on price.

Download or read book Southern Economic Journal written by and published by . This book was released on 2005 with total page 1262 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Contains section : Book reviews.

Download or read book Handbook of Electronic Security and Digital Forensics written by Hamid Jahankhani and published by World Scientific. This book was released on 2010 with total page 708 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The widespread use of information and communications technology (ICT) has created a global platform for the exchange of ideas, goods and services, the benefits of which are enormous. However, it has also created boundless opportunities for fraud and deception. Cybercrime is one of the biggest growth industries around the globe, whether it is in the form of violation of company policies, fraud, hate crime, extremism, or terrorism. It is therefore paramount that the security industry raises its game to combat these threats. Today's top priority is to use computer technology to fight computer crime, as our commonwealth is protected by firewalls rather than firepower. This is an issue of global importance as new technologies have provided a world of opportunity for criminals. This book is a compilation of the collaboration between the researchers and practitioners in the security field; and provides a comprehensive literature on current and future e-security needs across applications, implementation, testing or investigative techniques, judicial processes and criminal intelligence. The intended audience includes members in academia, the public and private sectors, students and those who are interested in and will benefit from this handbook.

Download or read book Consumer Protection and Online Auction Platforms written by Christine Riefa and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-03-03 with total page 277 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Online auctions have undergone many transformations and continue to attract millions of customers worldwide. However these popular platforms remain understudied by legal scholars and misunderstood by legislators. This book explores the legal classification of online auction sites across a range of countries in Europe. Including empirical studies conducted on 28 online auction websites in the UK, the research focusses on the protection of consumers’ economic rights and highlights the shortcomings that the law struggles to control. With examinations into important developments, including the Consumer Rights Directive and the latest case law from the CJEU on the liability of intermediaries, Riefa anticipates changes in the law, and points out further changes that are needed to create a safe legal environment for consumers, whilst preserving the varied business model adopted by online auction sites. The study provides insights into how technical measures as well as a tighter legislative framework or enforcement pattern could provide consumers with better protection, in turn reinforcing trust, and ultimately benefiting the online auction platforms themselves.

Download or read book Willingness to Pay and Competition in Online Auctions written by Tat Y. Chan and published by . This book was released on 2006 with total page 32 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: We model how to measure consumer willingness to pay (WTP) from an English or ascending first-price auction based on two general bidding premises: no bidder bids more than her WTP, and no bidder allows a rival bidder to win at a price that she is willing to beat (Haile and Tamer 2003). In other words, we propose a quot;no regretquot; rule in bidding. Other than that, we do not impose restrictive assumptions on maximands or behavior of bidders in a competitive auction context. We postulate WTP as having two components: a pure product feature component and one based on the auction market environment. The latter includes bidder experience, seller reputation, and measures for competition among bidders and among items. The proposed model is general enough to include quot;buy it nowquot; (BIN) (equivalent to a posted price) auction mechanism. We use data of notebook auctions from one of the largest Internet auction sites in Korea. We find that most product characteristics matter in the expected ways. Our other primary findings are as follows: (1) WTP declines as more similar items are concurrently listed with the focal item; there is an additional effect if these similar items also belong to the same brand. Therefore, market thickness matters for consumer WTP. (2) More extensive site-surfing and bidding histories lead to lower WTP, implying that search costs and experience matter in bidding. As specific substantive benefits, we demonstrate how sellers can calculate changes in WTP, and hence the expected revenue, as the number of concurrently available similar items varies.

Download or read book Willingness to Pay for Status Signals in Online Luxury Markets written by Yue Yuan and published by . This book was released on 2020 with total page 39 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: We study consumers' valuation of status signals by estimating consumers' willingness to pay for a luxury item with a quiet vs. a prominent logo. We collected data from two online markets on sales of two luxury handbags that differ only in the prominence of their logo. We use these data to estimate the premium in consumers' willingness to pay for the handbag with the quiet logo, as well as to test hypotheses as to how the condition of the handbag and the sales mode affects that premium. We find consumers are willing to pay a sizeable premium of $151-$189, or 15-20% of the retail price, for the quiet handbags as compared to the loud handbags. This price premium decreases as a handbag's condition worsens, but is larger for quiet handbags purchased at a fixed price rather than at auction. Our findings provide empirical support for research suggesting that an elite set of consumers, i.e., consumers with more social capital or social connectedness, are willing to pay a premium for quiet luxury goods.

Download or read book The Economics of the Internet and E commerce written by Michael R. Baye and published by Elsevier. This book was released on 2002-10-31 with total page 280 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The first six chapters of the text examine four broad issues: the role of the Internet in fostering competition, its impact on price dispersion and on business-to-business transactions, and the importance of reputation and trust in the new economy. The last four chapters examine the impact of the Internet on the organization of firms, the efficiency of auctions in the Internet age, how consumers choose websites and acquire product information, and the growing problem of congestion on the Internet.

Download or read book Understanding and Mitigating Product Uncertainty in Online Auction Marketplaces written by Paul A. Pavlou and published by . This book was released on 2015 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Internet interface poses a difficulty for buyers in evaluating products online, particularly physical experience and durable goods, such as used cars. This increases buyers' product uncertainty, defined as the buyer's perceived estimate of the variance in product quality based on subjective probabilities about the product's characteristics and whether the product will perform as expected. However, the literature has largely ignored product uncertainty and mostly focused on mitigating buyer's seller uncertainty. To address this void, this study aims to conceptualize the construct of product uncertainty and propose its antecedents and consequences in online auction marketplaces. First, drawing upon the theory of markets with asymmetric information, we propose product uncertainty to be distinct from, yet affected by, seller uncertainty. Second, based on auction pricing theory, we propose that product uncertainty and seller uncertainty negatively affect two key success outcomes of online marketplaces: price premium and transaction activity. Third, following information signaling theory, we propose a set of product information signals to mitigate product uncertainty: (1) online product descriptions (textual, visual, multimedia); (2) third-party product certifications (inspection, history report, warranty); (3) auction posted prices (reserve, starting, buy-it-now); and (4) intrinsic product characteristics (book value and usage). Finally, we propose that the effect of online product descriptions and intrinsic product characteristics on product uncertainty is moderated by seller uncertainty. The proposed model is supported by a unique dataset comprised of a combination of primary (survey) data drawn from 331 buyers who bid upon a used car on eBay Motors, matched with secondary transaction data from the corresponding online auctions. The results distinguish between product and seller uncertainty, show the stronger role of product uncertainty on price premiums and transaction activity compared to seller uncertainty, empirically identify the most influential product information signals, and support the mediating role of product uncertainty. This paper contributes to and has implications for better understanding the nature and role of product uncertainty, identifying mechanisms for mitigating product uncertainty, and demonstrating complementarities between product and seller information signals. The model's generalizability and implications are discussed.

Download or read book Information Dispersion and Auction Prices written by Pai-Ling Yin and published by . This book was released on 2006 with total page 46 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Do bidders behave as auction theory predicts they should? How do bidders (and thus, prices) react to different types of information? This paper derives implications of auction theory with respect to the dispersion of private information signals in an auction. I conduct a survey of non-bidders to construct a measure of information dispersion that is independent of bidding data. This permits joint tests of Bayesian-Nash equilibrium bidder behavior and information structure (common vs. private value) in a sample of eBay auctions for computers. The measure also allows me to separately estimate the price effects of seller reputation and product information. eBay prices appear consistent with Bayesian-Nash common value bidding behavior. Uncertainty about the value of goods due to information dispersed over auction participants plays a larger role than uncertainty about the trustworthiness of the sellers, but both are significant drivers of price. Thus, seller reputation complements, rather than substitutes for, information provided in the auction descriptions by lending credibility to that information, creating an incentive for sellers to reduce uncertainty in their auctions.

Download or read book Putting Auction Theory to Work written by Paul Milgrom and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2004-01-12 with total page 378 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book provides a comprehensive introduction to modern auction theory and its important new applications. It is written by a leading economic theorist whose suggestions guided the creation of the new spectrum auction designs. Aimed at graduate students and professionals in economics, the book gives the most up-to-date treatments of both traditional theories of 'optimal auctions' and newer theories of multi-unit auctions and package auctions, and shows by example how these theories are used. The analysis explores the limitations of prominent older designs, such as the Vickrey auction design, and evaluates the practical responses to those limitations. It explores the tension between the traditional theory of auctions with a fixed set of bidders, in which the seller seeks to squeeze as much revenue as possible from the fixed set, and the theory of auctions with endogenous entry, in which bidder profits must be respected to encourage participation.

Download or read book Understanding Willingness to Pay Formation of Repeat Bidders in Sequential Online Auctions written by Paulo Goes and published by . This book was released on 2021 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A growing number of vendors are using a sequence of online auctions to sell large inventories of identical items. Although bidding strategies and bidder behavior in single auctions have been extensively studied, limited research exists on bidding in sequential auctions. We seek to explain how bidders in such an environment learn from the information, and form and update their willingness to pay (WTP). Using a large data set from an online auction retailer, we analyze the evolution of the bidders' WTP as well as the effect of auction design on bidders' WTP in sequential auctions. We see our study in the context of a longitudinal field experiment, in which we were able to track actions of repeat bidders over an extended period of time. Our results show that bidders' WTP in sequential auctions can be explained from their demand characteristics, their participation experience in previous auctions, outcomes in previous auctions, and auction design parameters. We also observe, characterize, and measure what we call a modified demand reduction effect exhibited across different auctions, over time, by multiunit demand bidders. Our findings are important to enable better auction mechanism design, and more sophisticated bidding tools that explore the rich information environment of sequential auctions. Full paper available at https://doi.org/10.1287/isre.1080.0216.

Download or read book Return on Reputation in Online Auction Markets written by Kirthi Kalyanam and published by . This book was released on 2016 with total page 38 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This research develops an assurances framework to assess the effect of a seller's feedback “reputation” on the closing price of an online auction. The framework treats bidders as if they were 'intuitive statisticians' in their use of reputation cues. The framework leads to hypotheses about how information-based assurances (particularly feedback scores and the seller's provision of information about the product) may be used by buyers to reduce their trading risks. The hypotheses are tested using data collected from the eBay web site on auctions of Palm Pilot personal digital assistants. It is found that the higher the seller's reputation the higher is the average closing price of the auction, which constitutes a return on reputation (ROR). Thus the reputation infrastructure rewards good behavior with positive economic outcomes and helps to sustain a virtuous cycle in the online ecosystem. More specifically, it is found that: (a) negative comments are weighted more heavily than positive ones (b) negative feedback is subject to diminishing returns (c) the assurance offered by reputation is more salient among risk-averse buyers and (d) a high level of information about the merchandise also provides another form of assurance. However, when faced with a high level of information, risk-averse buyers seem to rely less on the sellers reputation score for assurance (a three way negative interaction between risk aversion, reputation and high information). The economic impact of these findings is that the seller of a Palm Pilot who has a high reputation can expect to receive as much as 12.6% more for the item than if he had a low reputation score. Of course, eBay also participates in this upside through its commission structure as well as the wider impact that the feedback seems to have. It is argued that the market for assurances is a contributor to eBay's success and is also essential to the optimal functioning of any online market.

Download or read book Seller Reputation written by Heski Bar-Isaac and published by Now Publishers Inc. This book was released on 2008 with total page 96 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Seller Reputation introduces a unifying framework that embeds a number of different approaches to seller reputation, incorporating both hidden information and hidden action. This framework is used to stress that the way in which consumers learn affects both behavior and outcomes. In particular, the extent to which information is generated and socially aggregated determines the efficiency of markets. After reviewing these theoretical building blocks, Seller Reputation examines several applications and empirical concerns. It highlights that the environment in which a transaction is embedded helps determine whether the transaction will occur and how parties will behave. Institutions, ranging from the design of online markets to norms in a community, can be understood as ensuring that concerns for reputation lead to more efficient outcomes. Similarly, the desire to affect consumer beliefs regarding the firm's incentives can help us understand strategic firm decisions that seem unrelated to the particular transactions they wish to promote. Seller Reputation concludes by considering slightly different models of reputation that lie beyond the scope of this framework, briefly reviewing the somewhat sparse empirical literature and suggesting future directions for research.

Download or read book The Economics of Information Technology written by Hal R. Varian and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2004-12-23 with total page 114 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Economics of Information Technology is a concise and accessible review of some of the important economic factors affecting information technology industries. These industries are characterized by high fixed costs and low marginal costs of production, large switching costs for users, and strong network effects. These factors combine to produce some unique behavior. The book consists of two parts. In the first part, Professor Varian outlines the basic economics of these industries. In the second part, Professors Farrell and Shapiro describe the impact of these factors on competition policy. The clarity of the analysis and exposition makes this an ideal introduction for undergraduate and graduate students in economics, business strategy, law and related areas.

Download or read book Advanced Methodologies and Technologies in Digital Marketing and Entrepreneurship written by Khosrow-Pour, D.B.A., Mehdi and published by IGI Global. This book was released on 2018-11-09 with total page 818 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: As businesses aim to compete internationally, they must be apprised of new methods and technologies to improve their digital marketing strategy in order to remain ahead of their competition. Trends in entrepreneurship that drive consumer engagement and business initiatives, such as social media marketing, yields customer retention and positive feedback. Advanced Methodologies and Technologies in Digital Marketing and Entrepreneurship provides information on emerging trends in business innovation, entrepreneurship, and marketing strategies. While highlighting challenges such as successful social media interactions and consumer engagement, this book explores valuable information within various business environments and industries such as e-commerce, small and medium enterprises, hospitality and tourism management, and customer relationship management. This book is an ideal source for students, marketers, social media marketers, business managers, public relations professionals, promotional coordinators, economists, hospitality industry professionals, entrepreneurs, and researchers looking for relevant information on new methods in digital marketing and entrepreneurship.

Download or read book Encyclopedia of Information Science and Technology Fourth Edition written by Khosrow-Pour, D.B.A., Mehdi and published by IGI Global. This book was released on 2017-06-20 with total page 8356 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In recent years, our world has experienced a profound shift and progression in available computing and knowledge sharing innovations. These emerging advancements have developed at a rapid pace, disseminating into and affecting numerous aspects of contemporary society. This has created a pivotal need for an innovative compendium encompassing the latest trends, concepts, and issues surrounding this relevant discipline area. During the past 15 years, the Encyclopedia of Information Science and Technology has become recognized as one of the landmark sources of the latest knowledge and discoveries in this discipline. The Encyclopedia of Information Science and Technology, Fourth Edition is a 10-volume set which includes 705 original and previously unpublished research articles covering a full range of perspectives, applications, and techniques contributed by thousands of experts and researchers from around the globe. This authoritative encyclopedia is an all-encompassing, well-established reference source that is ideally designed to disseminate the most forward-thinking and diverse research findings. With critical perspectives on the impact of information science management and new technologies in modern settings, including but not limited to computer science, education, healthcare, government, engineering, business, and natural and physical sciences, it is a pivotal and relevant source of knowledge that will benefit every professional within the field of information science and technology and is an invaluable addition to every academic and corporate library.

Download or read book Discovering Prices written by Paul Milgrom and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 2017-05-23 with total page 222 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Traditional economic theory studies idealized markets in which prices alone can guide efficient allocation, with no need for central organization. Such models build from Adam Smith’s famous concept of an invisible hand, which guides markets and renders regulation or interference largely unnecessary. Yet for many markets, prices alone are not enough to guide feasible and efficient outcomes, and regulation alone is not enough, either. Consider air traffic control at major airports. While prices could encourage airlines to take off and land at less congested times, prices alone do just part of the job; an air traffic control system is still indispensable to avoid disastrous consequences. With just an air traffic controller, however, limited resources can be wasted or poorly used. What’s needed in this and many other real-world cases is an auction system that can effectively reveal prices while still maintaining enough direct control to ensure that complex constraints are satisfied. In Discovering Prices, Paul Milgrom—the world’s most frequently cited academic expert on auction design—describes how auctions can be used to discover prices and guide efficient resource allocations, even when resources are diverse, constraints are critical, and market-clearing prices may not even exist. Economists have long understood that externalities and market power both necessitate market organization. In this book, Milgrom introduces complex constraints as another reason for market design. Both lively and technical, Milgrom roots his new theories in real-world examples (including the ambitious U.S. incentive auction of radio frequencies, whose design he led) and provides economists with crucial new tools for dealing with the world’s growing complex resource-allocation problems.