Seeding strategies have strong influences on the success of viral marketing campaigns, but previous studies using computer simulations and analytical models have produced conflicting recommendations about the optimal seeding strategy. This study compares four seeding strategies in two complementary small-scale field experiments, as well as in one real-life viral marketing campaign involving more than 200,000 customers of a mobile phone service provider. The empirical results show that the best seeding strategies can be up to eight times more successful than other seeding strategies. Seeding to well-connected people is the most successful approach because these attractive seeding points are more likely to participate in viral marketing campaigns. This finding contradicts a common assumption in other studies. Well-connected people also actively use their greater reach but do not have more influence on their peers than do less well-connected people.
Geographic proximity has become increasingly relevant due to the growing number of marketing services that use consumers' geographic locations, thus increasing the importance of gaining insights from this information. In five studies (both field and experimental), the authors analyze the effect of geographic proximity on social influence and demonstrate that not only social proximity but also perceived homophily can trigger social influence. They find that this effect holds under alternative representations of geographic distance and is confirmed for a range of different services and even for physical goods. Furthermore, the authors show that geographic proximity has a relative effect because the social influence of a closer sender is stronger than that of a more distant sender, regardless of the absolute distances. They present managerially relevant conditions under which the influence of geographic proximity not only is comparable to other types of information such as age or gender but also provides sufficient informational value for customers to offset differences among alternatives (e.g., due to higher prices) in trade-off decisions.
In recent years, social media have become a popular channel through which customers and companies can interact. However, companies struggle to assess whether their investments in
establishing and maintaining brand pages in social media actually meet their high expectations with respect to developing and retaining customers. Based on three empirical studies, the authors explore the role of interactions through corporate social media channels, such as Facebook brand pages, in customer relationship management. The results indicate that social media interactions indeed ease the upselling efforts and reduce the risk of churn. These positive effects offset the observed increases with regard to the number of service requests and the higher overall service cost. Thus, we ultimately find customers who interact with the brand on social media to be more profitable.
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