[Paper] What is Differentiation and How Does it Work ?

Title: What is Differentiation and How Does it Work?

Author(s): Byron Sharp & John Dawes

Abstract: In this article we provide a basic review of the relationship between differentiation and profitability. In particular we address the misconception that the reward of differentiation must be a price premium. We conclude with the following:

Differentiation is when a firm/brand outperforms rival brands in the provision of a feature(s) such that it faces reduced sensitivity for other features (or one feature). Through not having to provide these other features the firm has an avenue to save costs. The firm benefits from the reduced sensitivity in terms of reduced directness of competition allowing it to capture a greater proportion of the value created by exchange.

We observe that real world differentiation is a pervasive feature of modern markets, but seems to be largely due differences in distribution and awareness, and occasionally design. Brand level differentiation on functional features is less common due to competitive matching.

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[Paper] Effectiveness of Paid Search Advertising: Experimental Evidence

Title: Effectiveness of Paid Search Advertising: Experimental Evidence

Authors : Daisy Dai, Michael Luca

Abstract: Paid search has become an increasingly common form of advertising, comprising about half of all online advertising expenditures. To shed light on the effectiveness of paid search, we design and analyze a large-scale field experiment on the review platform Yelp.com. The experiment consists of roughly 18,000 restaurants and 24 million advertising exposures – randomly assigning paid search advertising packages to more than 7,000 restaurants for a three-month period, with randomization done at the restaurant level to assess the overall impact of advertisements. We find that advertising increases a restaurant’s Yelp page views by 25% on average. Advertising also increases the number of purchase intentions – including getting directions, browsing the restaurant’s website, and calling the restaurant – by 18%, 9%, and 13% respectively, and raises the number of reviews by 5%, suggesting that advertising also affects the number of restaurant-goers. All advertising effects drop to zero immediately after the advertising period. A back of the envelope calculation suggests that advertising would produce a positive return on average for restaurants in our sample.

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[PDF] Debunking the Myths, Lies, and Misconceptions of Word of Mouth Marketing

Title: Debunking the Myths, Lies, and Misconceptions of Word of Mouth Marketing

Author: Ted Wright

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[PDF] The Maker's Manual

Title: The Maker's Manual

Author(s): PSFK

About: The Maker’s Manual explores how everyone from do-it-yourselfers and artists to inventors and entrepreneurs are leveraging new tools, platforms and services to take their ideas from concepts to reality.

In our Democratized Creation theme we explore how the hardware and tools required to start building DIY technology projects are becoming more widely available, cost-effective and user friendly, encouraging a greater number of people to become involved in the Maker Movement regardless of their knowledge and level of skill. With the Community Exchange theme we look at how a growing number of digital platforms and physical spaces are helping to cultivate the Maker Movement by bringing people together to share essential knowledge and resources, while simultaneously creating new marketplaces for buying and selling their products.

The report also looks at Growth Systems and explores how a new set of services are allowing the Maker community to take their projects from personal passions to full-fledged product lines by providing flexible and cost-effective access to financial capital, copyright management tools and manufacturing facilities. Within these themes, we take an in-depth look at ten key trends, bringing them to life with best-in-class examples, constructing unique user experience paths for readers to navigate them based on their level of involvement in the Maker Movement.

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[PDF] Everything you need to persuade colleagues and clients of the power of consumer trends

Title: Instant Trend Expert

Author(s): trendwatching.com

Contents: 10 critical trend questions and their answers to help you convince the skeptics.

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[Report] A Roadmap to the Future of Marketing

Title: Dollars, Bits and Atoms: A Roadmap to the Future of Marketing

Author: Rob Salkowitz

Abstract: Technology is driving unprecedented disruption in marketing and advertising. Where is it all going and what does it mean to today’s marketing decision-makers? This paper and forecast map present a high-level view of the changing landscape for marketers. Our goal is to provide a schematic for understanding the causes, manifestations, and implications of change and a roadmap for organizations looking past the next bend in the road.

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[Paper] Facebook's emotion manipulation study

Title: Experimental evidence of massive-scale emotional contagion through social networks

Authors: Adam D. I. Kramera, Jamie E. Guilloryb and Jeffrey T. Hancock

Abstract: Emotional states can be transferred to others via emotional contagion, leading people to experience the same emotions without their awareness. Emotional contagion is well established in laboratory experiments, with people transferring positive and negative emotions to others. Data from a large real-world social network, collected over a 20-y period suggests that longer-lasting moods (e.g., depression, happiness) can be transferred through networks [Fowler JH, Christakis NA (2008) BMJ 37:a2338], although the results are controversial. In an experiment with people who use Facebook, we test whether emotional contagion occurs outside of in-person interaction between individuals by reducing the amount of emotional content in the News Feed. When positive expressions were reduced, people produced fewer positive posts and more negative posts; when negative expressions were reduced, the opposite pattern occurred. These results indicate that emotions expressed by others on Facebook influence our own emotions, constituting experimental evidence for massive-scale contagion via social networks. This work also suggests that, in contrast to prevailing assumptions, in-person interaction and nonverbal cues are not strictly necessary for emotional contagion, and that the observation of others’ positive experiences constitutes a positive experience for people.

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[Book PDF] Madison Valley: How Madison Avenue can be more like Silicon Valley

Title: Madison Valley: Building Digital Products. Getting the most out of talent. And how Madison Avenue can be more like Silicon Valley

Author: Leif Abraham

Abstract: Nowadays, a relationship to a company is most often built through product experience, not just advertising. 
But brand thinkers are still often being left out of the process of product innovation until the new product needs to be launched. And on agency side, we still have massive organizations working for just a tiny piece of the brand, the advertising. When you look at these organizations, you will realize that they have much of the same creative talent you will find in a startup incubator in Silicon Valley, and yet these environments are primarily used to create things like funny videos, rather than successful companies. 
This is not the talent’s fault. It’s the fault of an agency model that is not set up to build or maintain more than just content. 
Agency folks know that and feel how their influence is slipping away, so in order to conquer more than just advertising, agencies are creating “Labs” and internal incubator to show they got it. But let’s be honest, most of these are bullsh** PR tactics that are not taken seriously inside the company. These “Labs” are still living in the same old structures of the ad agency and the people involved still have to do their advertising client work first, before they’re allowed to put their “twenty percent” into the lab. 
This book provides an analysis of how product innovation is treated in agencies today. It shows how the model can be changed to cultivate an environment and business model that creates successful, new products, as well as deeper agency-client relationships. It also provides a blueprint for motivating and empowering team structures that will help to get the most out of employees and their talents. And it will conclude with actionable tips for brand managers and agency execs to start right now.

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[Paper] How representative are experimental findings from American university students?

Title: The Weirdest People in the World : How representative are experimental findings from American university students? What do we really know about human psychology?

Authors: Joseph Henrich, Steven J. Heine & Ara Norenzayan

Abstract: Broad claims about human psychology and behavior based on narrow samples from Western societies are regularly published. Are such species‐generalizing claims justified? This review suggests not only substantial variability in experimental results across populations in basic domains, but that standard subjects are unusual compared with the rest of the species—outliers. The domains reviewed include visual perception, fairness, spatial reasoning, moral reasoning, thinking‐styles, and self‐concepts. This suggests (1) caution in addressing questions of human nature from this slice of humanity, and (2) that understanding human psychology will require broader subject pools. We close by proposing ways to address these challenges.

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[Book PDF] It's Complicated: The social lives of networked teens

Title: It's Complicated: The social lives of networked teens

Author: danah boyd

Abstract: What is new about how teenagers communicate through services such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram? Do social media affect the quality of teens’ lives? In this eye-opening book, youth culture and technology expert danah boyd uncovers some of the major myths regarding teens’ use of social media.

She explores tropes about identity, privacy, safety, danger, and bullying. Ultimately, boyd argues that society fails young people when paternalism and protectionism hinder teenagers’ ability to become informed, thoughtful, and engaged citizens through their online interactions.

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[Paper] Using the Snowball Method in Marketing Research on Hidden Populations

Title:  Using the Snowball Method in Marketing Research on Hidden Populations

Authors: Mirela-Cristina Voicu & Alina-Mihaela Babonea

Abstract: Following the classical sampling theory, the researcher selects samples of people, businesses or others, in order to obtain the desired information. Drawing the samples is usually done by randomly selecting from a list representing the target population. In practice, this list is often not available. There are cases in which the population of interest is not fully known, not well defined and fully listed, and creating a sampling frame is difficult or impossible for the researcher.The solution to this situation comes from the snowball sampling method, the best way we can study hidden populations in marketing research. In this paper we are approaching the snowball method as a mean of accessing vulnerable and more impenetrable social groupings revealing the latest advances of this technique.

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[PDF] A New Brand of Marketing

Title: A NEW BRAND OF MARKETING: The 7 Meta-Trends of Modern Marketing as a Technology-Powered Discipline

Author: Scott Brinkner

Abstract: This 40-page book "frames the epic collaboration underway between marketers and technologists, set against the backdrop of two seismic shifts in marketing today:

First, how marketing is taking over the business. We can debate functions and org charts. But in a hyper-connected digital world, everything that a business does — the entire customer experience that it delivers, from the very first touchpoint onward — is now the scope of marketing.

Second, how technology is taking over marketing. Marketing has more software entwined in its mission today than any other profession in the history of computing. Leveraging these capabilities requires new approaches to marketing strategy and management — as well as new kinds of talents within the marketing team, such as marketing technologists." [Read More]

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[Paper] The Value of Context, or what qualitative research can learn from behavioural economics

Title:  The Value of Context, or what qualitative research can learn from behavioural economics

Author: Anjali Puri (TNS)


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[Paper] The Role of Music Preferences in Interpersonal Perception

Paper: Message in a Ballad: The Role of Music Preferences in Interpersonal Perception

Authors: Peter J. Rentfrow, Samuel D. Gosling

Abstract: How is information about people conveyed through their preferences for certain kinds of music? Here we show that individuals use their music preferences to communicate information about their personalities to observers, and that observers can use such information to form impressions of others. Study 1 revealed that music was the most common topic in conversations among strangers given the task of getting acquainted. Why was talk about music so prevalent? Study 2 showed that (a) observers were able to form consensual and accurate impressions on the basis of targets’ music preferences, (b) music preferences were related to targets’ personalities, (c) the specific cues that observers used tended to be the ones that were valid, and (d) music preferences reveal information that is different from that obtained in other zero-acquaintance contexts. Discussion focuses on the mechanisms that may underlie between personality and music preferences.

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[Paper] The Speed of New Ideas

Title: The Speed of New Ideas: Trust, Institutions and  the Diffusion of  New Products

Authors: Felix Oberholzer-Gee, Victor Calanog

Abstract: Trust in buyer-supplier relationships is sometimes regarded as a competitive advantage because trust can increase the gains from trade for firms and their suppliers. In this study, we document a particular type of competitive advantage conferred by trust. Using adoption rates of a new product as a case study, we show that trust protects current suppliers from competitors who offer innovative products. Buyers who trust their current suppliers are less likely to seek information about the new product and they express less interest in purchasing it. Once the product becomes available, they do in fact make fewer purchases. We also find that entrepreneurs from less trusted groups – in this study, African-Americans – find it particularly difficult to overcome the barriers erected by trust. Trust, we conclude, confers competitive advantage by slowing down the diffusion of new ideas and products in the economy. As trust is built up over time, earning a buyer’s trust confers a significant first-mover advantage.

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[PDF] Behavior Change Strategy Cards

Title: Behavior Change Strategy Cards

Author: Artefact Group

Abstract: "This set of 23 cards was crafted to help designers, researchers, and anyone facing a behavior change challenge, think through strategies to nudge people toward positive behavioral outcomes.  They work particularly well when you have in mind a specific behavior that you want to change (e.g., “We want to get more people to ride the bus,” or, “We want people to stop smoking”). We focused on making these strategies easy to grasp, incorporate, and act on.

The set is divided into five thematic sections, each featuring strategies and examples that will help you understand why the strategies are effective, and prompt you to think through how they might be used.

Make it personal: The persuasive power of “me” and “my” (cards 1– 6)
Tip the scales: How perceptions of losses and gains influence our choices (cards 7– 13)
Craft the journey: Why the entire experience matters (cards 14 – 17)
Set up the options: Setting the stage for the desired decision (cards 18 – 21)
Keep it simple: Avoiding undesirable outcomes (cards 22 – 23)" Read More

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[PDF] A Brand-Builder’s Guide to the Universe: 17 Ways to Build a Great Brand Today

Title: A Brand-Builder’s Guide to the Universe: 17 Ways to Build a Great Brand Today

Author: Denise Lee Yohn 

Abstract: “Companies with great brands conceive of their brands as complete strategic platforms. They identify the key values and attributes that define their brands and then use them to fuel, align, and guide everything they do. Operationalizing their brands in this way produces results because companies aren’t simply expressing or marketing their brands—they’re using them to ignite their organizations and create real business value.

This manifesto highlights seventeen developments that are influencing brand-building today and what great brands are doing about them.”

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[Paper] Phrases That Predict Success on Kickstarter

Title: The Language That Gets People To Give: Phrases That Predict Success on Kickstarter

Authors: Tanushree Mitra, Eric Gilbert

Abstract: Crowdfunding sites like Kickstarter—where entrepreneurs and artists look to the internet for funding—have quickly risen to prominence. However, we know very little about the factors driving the “crowd” to take projects to their funding goal. In this paper we explore the factors which lead to successfully funding a crowdfunding project. We study a corpus of 45K crowdfunded projects, analyzing 9M phrases and 59 other variables commonly present on crowdfunding sites. The language used in the project has surprising predictive power—accounting for 58.56% of the variance around successful funding. A closer look at the phrases shows they exhibit general persuasion principles. For example, also receive two reflects the principle of Reciprocity and is one of the top predictors of successful funding. We conclude this paper by announcing the release of the predictive phrases along with the control variables as a public dataset, hoping that our work can enable new features on crowdfunding sites—tools to help both backers and project creators make the best use of their time and money.

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[PDF] The Human Brand : How we relate to people, products and companies

Title: The Human Brand : How we relate to people, products and companies

Author: Chris Malone

Abstract : “Social psychologists have determined that primitive humans, in their struggle for existence, developed the ability to judge other people almost instantly along two categories of perception, which are known as warmth and competence. In fact, all humans have a primal, unconscious ability to make these two crucial judgments with a high degree of speed and accuracy: What are the intentions of this person toward me? And how capable are they of carrying out those intentions? […]

We apply these warmth and competence judgments in all our relationships, including those involving commercial transactions. Companies and brands have the same capacity to stir up these hard-wired primal passions as people do, and we engage with them on the same basis. We experience feelings of affection and admiration for companies and brands that treat us well, and we feel insult or even rage when we believe that one of those companies has given us poor service or cheated us. […]

Unfortunately, our studies show that most companies and brands fall well short of customer expectations on both warmth and competence. They are seen as selfish, greedy, and concerned only with their own immediate gain. The constant pressure for faster and larger profits raises the question of whether most of them can ever meet the standards for trust that we all unconsciously expect from everyone we interact with.”

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[Paper] The Theory of Peak Advertising and The Future of the Web

Title: The Theory of Peak Advertising and the Future of the Web

Authors : Tim Hwang & Adi Kamdar

Abstract: This paper presents a brief theoretical and empirical grounding for the theory of Peak Advertising -- the argument that an overall slowing in the online advertising industry will eventually force significant shifts in the experience of the web itself.

Key Findings :

• Key indicators for online advertising effectiveness have declined since the launch of the first banner advertisement in 1994. These declines are increasingly placing pressure on even the most established businesses in the space.
• These developments suggest important (and potentially painful) implications for market structure, privacy, and authenticity online.
• Existing alternatives appear at present to be insufficient to replace lost revenue from near-future declines in the value of display, search, and mobile advertising.
• Ultimately, the economics of the web will necessitate pivotal decisions about the financial underpinnings of the Internet in the decades to come.

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