Dr. Oliver Francis Koch

With the boom of the app economy, users’ location information has become an increasingly valuable differentiator to deliver personalized products and services, yet continues to raise severe privacy concerns. While research on information privacy has paid great attention on explaining and predicting factors of information disclosure decisions, there is still a significant gap in terms of how app providers can combine different mechanisms in the design of their apps to effectuate better… Mehr anzeigen

With the boom of the app economy, users’ location information has become an increasingly valuable differentiator to deliver personalized products and services, yet continues to raise severe privacy concerns. While research on information privacy has paid great attention on explaining and predicting factors of information disclosure decisions, there is still a significant gap in terms of how app providers can combine different mechanisms in the design of their apps to effectuate better disclosure outcomes. Drawing on a randomized online experiment with 143 smartphone users, we analyze how pull (i.e., services with user-controlled position awareness) and push (i.e., demanding always-on access location tracking) information delivery and social proof cues separately and jointly affect users’ actual location information disclosure. The results reveal that both strategies increase actual location information disclosure via two distinct mediation paths. While pull information delivery mitigates users’ privacy concerns, social proof increases their trusting beliefs. However, when both strategies are employed together, we found that social proof overrides the effect of pull information delivery mechanisms.
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Freemium business models, where companies offer a free basic and a value-enhanced paid version of a product, have become ubiquitous across software, games and a broad range of web services. Despite the many benefits of freemium, most firms suffer from too few premium subscribers (3–5 %), which challenges their profitability. Although free trials have helped improve premium conversions, research hitherto has paid little attention towards what works effectively. Therefore, we examine the effect… Mehr anzeigen

Freemium business models, where companies offer a free basic and a value-enhanced paid version of a product, have become ubiquitous across software, games and a broad range of web services. Despite the many benefits of freemium, most firms suffer from too few premium subscribers (3–5 %), which challenges their profitability. Although free trials have helped improve premium conversions, research hitherto has paid little attention towards what works effectively. Therefore, we examine the effect of two common free trial strategies on consumers’ conversion likelihood: Freefirst, where consumers start in the free and then opt into a trial of the premium version and Premiumfirst, where things are experienced in reverse order. Based on a contest-based online experiment with 225 subjects, our analysis reveals that in contrast to Freefirst, Premiumfirst significantly increases conversion propensity and that this positive effect is greater when the premium and the free version are more similar. Weniger anzeigen

Against the backdrop of consumers being deluged with traditional online advertising,
which is increasingly manifesting in inefficient conversion outcomes, viral marketing
has become a pivotal component of marketing strategy. However, despite a robust
understanding about the impact of viral marketing as well as of factors that drive
consumer referral engagement, we know very little about the effect of traditional
promotional tactics on consumer referral decisions. Drawing on a… Mehr anzeigen

Against the backdrop of consumers being deluged with traditional online advertising,
which is increasingly manifesting in inefficient conversion outcomes, viral marketing
has become a pivotal component of marketing strategy. However, despite a robust
understanding about the impact of viral marketing as well as of factors that drive
consumer referral engagement, we know very little about the effect of traditional
promotional tactics on consumer referral decisions. Drawing on a randomized field
experiment in the context of an online fashion service named StyleCrowd, we
investigate the effects of scarcity and personalization, two classical promotional cues
that have become ubiquitous on the web and have received only minimal attention
hitherto, on actual referral behavior. Our analysis reveals that using these cues in
promotional campaigns is a balancing act: While scarcity cues affect referral
propensity regardless of whether a campaign is personalized or not, personalization
cues are particularly effective when scarcity is absent, yet are cancelled out when
scarcity is prevalent. We demonstrate that consumers’ perceptions of offer value drive
the impact of scarcity on referral likelihood, while consumer gratitude vis-à-vis the
marketer is the underlying mechanism for personalization’s influence on referral
decisions. Weniger anzeigen

Despite the widely recognized importance of continuous business model development for achieving product market fit, very little remains understood about efficient methods that may support this process in the context of nascent IT ventures. Contributions for supporting value proposition development, especially in the popular field of open innovation, have largely focused on well established firms and more traditional approaches such as the lead user method. More recent findings suggest novel… Mehr anzeigen

Despite the widely recognized importance of continuous business model development for achieving product market fit, very little remains understood about efficient methods that may support this process in the context of nascent IT ventures. Contributions for supporting value proposition development, especially in the popular field of open innovation, have largely focused on well established firms and more traditional approaches such as the lead user method. More recent findings suggest novel ways of virtual user integration, like the collection of user feedback via promotional campaigns, which is particularly prevalent among IT startups. However, these contributions have remained conspicuously theoretical. Therefore, by drawing on an experimental study in the context of the online fashion startup StyleCrowd, we investigate the role of scarcity and personalization, two classical promotional cues that have become ubiquitous on the web yet have been overlooked by research, in enhancing the virality of nascent ventures’ online promotional campaigns to enhance user feedback. Our analysis reveals that while scarcity cues affect social sharing regardless of whether a campaign is personalized or not, personalization cues are particularly effective when scarcity is absent, y Weniger anzeigen

Online referrals have become an important mechanism in leveraging
consumers’ social networks to spread firms’ promotional campaigns and
thus attract new customers. However, despite a robust understanding of
the benefits and drivers of consumer referrals, only minimal attention has
been paid towards the potential of classical promotional tactics in
influencing referral behavior. Therefore, this study examines scarcity and
social proof, two promotional cues which are linked to… Mehr anzeigen

Online referrals have become an important mechanism in leveraging
consumers’ social networks to spread firms’ promotional campaigns and
thus attract new customers. However, despite a robust understanding of
the benefits and drivers of consumer referrals, only minimal attention has
been paid towards the potential of classical promotional tactics in
influencing referral behavior. Therefore, this study examines scarcity and
social proof, two promotional cues which are linked to extant referral
literature and are of great practical relevance, in the context of a
randomized online experiment with the German startup Blinkist. Our
analysis reveals that scarcity cues affect consumers' referral propensity
regardless of the presence of social proof cues, but that social proof cues
amplify scarcity’s effect on consumer referral propensity. We demonstrate
that consumers’ perceptions of offer value drive the impact of scarcity on
referral likelihood and illuminate how social proof moderates this mediating
effect. Weniger anzeigen

Users typically draw on multiple quality signals to overcome their
uncertainties before installing smartphone applications. While several of
such signals have been studied separately, research still lacks an
integrated conceptual framework of signal classes and their relative
importance for app installation likelihood. Drawing on signaling theory, a
conjoint analysis of platform and environment signals was conducted based
on an online survey of 109 smartphone users. Five… Mehr anzeigen

Users typically draw on multiple quality signals to overcome their
uncertainties before installing smartphone applications. While several of
such signals have been studied separately, research still lacks an
integrated conceptual framework of signal classes and their relative
importance for app installation likelihood. Drawing on signaling theory, a
conjoint analysis of platform and environment signals was conducted based
on an online survey of 109 smartphone users. Five signals from three
distinct signal classes were found to have significant effects on users’
expected app quality perception, a holistic quality assessment that
mediates the signals’ impact on app installation likelihood. Our findings
suggest that while differing in magnitude, app-related and vendor-related
platform signals as well as external environment signals contribute
significantly towards expected app quality perceptions. This study provides
a nuanced analysis of platform and environment signals that drive app
installation and also contributes towards a better understanding of the
underlying decision process.
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