دانلود رایگان مقاله انگلیسی اهمیت موقعیت: شواهدی از آزمایش فیلدی خرید آنلاین - الزویر 2017

ABSTRACT:

Many empirical studies of online price dispersion show that sellers post different prices for homogeneous goods. However, seller heterogeneity is difficult to control for and posted prices may not reflect price dispersion in actual transactions. We contribute to this literature by selling identical simple goods (cell phone credits) at different prices from sellers that were identical except in name and with minimal ratings. The only way consumers could find us in this extremely thick market is to rank by price from lowest to highest. Out of 514 sales, 73 were of the higher priced item, for which we had non-negligible demand even when the price gap was 2.5%. Thus, even this selected sample of price-sensitive consumers do not necessarily buy the lowest priced item, all else being equal. Using independent variation in screen location and price, we are able to distinguish for the first time between search cost and limited attention based price dispersion.

V. Discussion

Our findings suggest that behavioral factors, such as limited attention, produce transactional price dispersion, even in settings where the purchase experience is exactly identical. Even though our consumers elected to sort offers by price, they appear more sensitive to the location of a listing relative to rival offers than to the price itself. Only at price differences of 2% or greater do consumers start to respond to price differences.

This should not be taken to mean that charging higher prices represents an effective business strategy. In exchange for a small increase in price, sellers suffer massive decreases in volume owing to their disadvantageous screen location. Depending on costs, it might be an effective strategy to price high and then to pay the necessary fees to appear at the top of the default list of search results a la Google. On a platform like Taobao, limited attention generates considerable value. Because location matters more than price, firms are willing to pay for privileged positions. They can profitably do so by charging premium prices.

While we do not claim that strategic seller behavior that leads to price dispersion does not exist, we find little evidence in favor of the “strategic” price dispersion of the sort envisaged by Baye and Morgan (2001). Competition for price-sensitive “shoppers” drives dispersion, at least theoretically, yet real-world “shoppers” are not terribly price-sensitive, and thus, defeat the rationale for producing price uncertainty suggested by the theory. Transactional price dispersion displays patterns much more consistent with behavioral models than with the homo economicus players inhabiting most theory models on the subject.