Market prices are well known to efficiently collect and aggregate diverse information regarding the economic value of goods, services, and firms, particularly when trading financial securities. We propose a novel application of the price discovery mechanism in the context of marketing research:...

We study the interaction between productive investment and persuasion activities in a principal-agent setting with strategic disclosure. In an attempt to persuade the principal, the agent diverts substantial resources from productive activities to information acquisition for persuasion, even...

Crowdfunding is a new and popular way of funding innovative products. Despite numerous advantages, there are challenges to this model, chief among them credibly signaling information about product quality to a pool of small, uninformed investors. We explore how an entrepreneur might accomplish...

A large body of research shows that tastes can reliably signal social group membership. Because standards of good taste vary between groups, the costs of acquiring them prevents dishonest signaling by outsiders. However, little research has examined signals of good taste within social groups,...

High-quality firms sometimes under-invest in Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) compared to lower quality firms. We show that information asymmetry in product quality could explain this behavior. Specifically, in a monopoly with information asymmetry, if only a small fraction of consumers is...

The purpose of the study is to analyse the changing role of tourism intermediaries in the distribution chain. Globalisation and the development of ICTs have undoubtedly changed both business practices and strategies as well as industry structures. They are also creating new rules governing...

The paper analyzes how the structure of social networks affects product diffusion and competition under different information regimes. Diffusion is modeled as the result of idiosyncratic adoption thresholds, local network effects, and information diffusion broadcasting and word-of mouth by...

Manufacturers often offer retailers buyback contracts to reduce retailers' inventory costs by repurchasing unsold inventory at a pre-specified returns price. We examine the signaling role of buyback contracts when the retailer is less informed about either the manufacturer's reliability of...