@misc{ReichsteinDost, author = {Reichstein, Thomas and Dost, Florian}, title = {Attention please! How attention drives social media engagement}, series = {Proceedings International Marketing Trends Conference 2024, Venice}, journal = {Proceedings International Marketing Trends Conference 2024, Venice}, isbn = {978-2-490372-18-8}, pages = {7}, abstract = {Social media has become an integral part of Internet usage, with billions of users worldwide. Therefore, it is increasingly important for marketers to understand how to optimize one of the most important variables for success: Engagement. This study examines the relationship between user attention and engagement on social media, considering the effect of caption text length and emojis. Using an eye-tracking experiment, we measure user attention and engagement (likes, clicks, comments) for 161 social media posts. Our results confirm that attention affects engagement. Furthermore, we show that text length and emojis moderate this relationship. This study makes an important contribution to understanding one of the most important mechanisms for driving engagement.}, language = {en} } @misc{RennieCleophasSykulskietal., author = {Rennie, Nicola and Cleophas, Catherine and Sykulski, Adam and Dost, Florian}, title = {Detecting outlier demand in railway networks}, series = {5th AIRO Young Workshop at Universit{\`a} degli Studi di Napoli Federico II, Italy}, volume = {5}, journal = {5th AIRO Young Workshop at Universit{\`a} degli Studi di Napoli Federico II, Italy}, pages = {31}, abstract = {Transport service providers, such as airlines and railways, often use revenue manage-ment to control offers and demand in mobility networks. Such systems rely on accu-rate demand forecasts as input for the underlying optimisation models. When changes in the market place cause demand to deviate from the expected values, revenue man-agement controls no longer fit for the resulting outliers. Analysts can intervene if they deem the demand forecast to be inaccurate. However, existing research on judgemen-tal forecasting highlights fallibility and bias when human decision makers are not sys-tematically supported in such tasks. This motivates the need for automated alerts to highlight outliers and thereby support analysts. Network effects complicate the problem of detecting outlier demand in practice. Pas-sengers often book travel itineraries that stretch across multiple legs of a network. Thereby, they requests products that require multiple resources - seats on several legs. In the rail and long-distance coach industries, the large number of possible itiner-aries makes it likely for outlier demand to affect multiple legs. At the same time, outli-er demand from a single itinerary may be difficult to recognise as it mixes with regular demand on individual legs. To support outlier detection in transport networks, we pre-sent a method to aggregates outlier detection across highly correlated legs. We propose to use the results of this analysis to construct a ranked alert list that can support ana-lyst decision making. We show that by aggregating we are able to improve detection performance compared to considering each leg in isolation.}, language = {en} } @misc{RennieCleophasSykulskietal., author = {Rennie, Nicola and Cleophas, Catherine and Sykulski, Adam and Dost, Florian}, title = {Detecting outlying demand in multi-leg bookings for transportation networks}, series = {31st European Conference on Operational Research (EURO) Proceedings}, volume = {31}, journal = {31st European Conference on Operational Research (EURO) Proceedings}, pages = {28}, abstract = {Network effects complicate transport demand forecasting in general and outlier detection in particular. For example, a sudden increase in demand for a specific destination will not only affect the legs arriving at that destination, but also connected legs nearby in the network. Network effects are particularly strong when service providers, such as railway or coach companies, offer many multi-leg itineraries. In such situations, automated alerts can help analysts to adjust demand forecasts and enable reliable planning. In this presentation, we outline a novel two-step method for automatically detecting outlying demand from transportation network book� ings. The first step clusters network legs according to the observed booking patterns. The second step identifies outliers within each cluster to create a ranked alert list of affected legs. We illustrate the method using empirical data obtained from Deutsche Bahn. In addition, we present a detailed simulation study that quantifies the improvement from the clustering step and implications of ranking to measure the criticality of the outliers. Our results show that the proposed approach outperforms independently analysing each leg, especially in highly connected networks where most passengers book multi-leg itineraries.}, language = {en} } @misc{Dost, author = {Dost, Florian}, title = {Bidirectional Links between Aggregate Advertising and Goods Consumption at the National Level}, series = {46th Eurasia Business and Economics Society Conference Book}, journal = {46th Eurasia Business and Economics Society Conference Book}, edition = {1}, publisher = {EBES}, address = {Istanbul - Turkey}, isbn = {978-605-71739-6-6}, pages = {99}, abstract = {A longstanding question in marketing and economics is whether all of advertising affects aggregate consumption. If it does not, the advertising-consumption system would be a zero-sum game; if it does, advertising can grow markets and represents an economic force of interest for marketing, economics, and public policy. Ashley, Granger, and Schmalensee (1980) test advertising's potential causal impact on aggregate goods consumption. Challenging prior empirical studies that suggested advertising drives aggregate consumption (Taylor \& Weiserbs, 1972), Ashley et al. show that advertising does not influence consumption; rather, consumption causes advertising in a landmark methodological study of the Granger causality test. Yet recent conceptualizations suggests this empirical result and especially the linear autoregression-based Granger method to be inconclusive. Wilkie and Moore (1999) propose a complex aggregate systems view to discussing macro impacts of marketing, and in such systems the Granger tests typically fails (Sugihara et al. 2012). The present research extends prior studies with a new more appropriate nonlinear method (convergence cross-mapping) to test the causal links between television or digital advertising and three types of aggregate consumption—durables, non-durables, and service consumption. The novel test, unlike the Granger causality test, confirms the existence of a bidirectional causal link between advertising and aggregate goods consumption. Specifically, and similar to the brand level, advertising effects on consumption are stronger for durable than for non-durable goods.}, language = {en} } @misc{PengDostLukasetal., author = {Peng, Yingying and Dost, Florian and Lukas, Bryan and Homburg, Christian}, title = {Four Types of Information Interplay in Product Reviews and their Sales Effects}, series = {2024 AMA Winter Academic Conference Proceedings}, journal = {2024 AMA Winter Academic Conference Proceedings}, editor = {Cross, Samantha and Saboo, Alok}, isbn = {978-0-87757-018-9}, pages = {604 -- 606}, abstract = {Consumer decision-making is influenced by user-generated information in reviews of products and services. We predict that sales levels are associated with two forms, respectively, of information inconsistency (confliction and competition) and consistency (confirmation and complementary) often found in product and service reviews. For our investigation, we classified information contained in tablet computer reviews as conflicting, competing, confirming, or complementing using BERT (Bidirectional Encoder Representations from Transformers) and word2vec (Word to Vector) techniques. Estimating an aggregated-level sales rank model over a 24-week period on reviews and sales data obtained from Amazon, we show that variations in tablet sales can be partially explained with our information classification. These findings provide new insights for user-generated content research.}, language = {en} } @misc{RennieCleophasSykulskietal., author = {Rennie, Nicola and Cleophas, Catherine and Sykulski, Adam and Dost, Florian}, title = {Outlier detection in network revenue management}, series = {OR Spectrum}, journal = {OR Spectrum}, issn = {0171-6468}, doi = {10.1007/s00291-023-00714-2}, abstract = {This paper presents an automated approach for providing ranked lists of outliers in observed demand to support analysts in network revenue management. Such network revenue management, e.g. for railway itineraries, needs accurate demand forecasts. However, demand outliers across or in parts of a network complicate accurate demand forecasting, and the network structure makes such demand outliers hard to detect. We propose a two-step approach combining clustering with functional outlier detection to identify outlying demand from network bookings observed on the leg level. The first step clusters legs to appropriately partition and pools booking patterns. The second step identifies outliers within each cluster and uses a novel aggregation method across legs to create a ranked alert list of affected instances. Our method outperforms analyses that consider leg data without regard for network implications and offers a computationally efficient alternative to storing and analysing all data on the itinerary level, especially in highly-connected networks where most customers book multi-leg products. A simulation study demonstrates the robustness of the approach and quantifies the potential revenue benefits from adjusting demand forecasts for offer optimisation. Finally, we illustrate the applicability based on empirical data obtained from Deutsche Bahn.}, language = {en} } @incollection{DostWilken, author = {Dost, Florian and Wilken, Robert}, title = {A Behavioral Approach to Pricing in Commodity Markets: Dual Processing of Prices within and around Willingness-to-Pay Ranges}, series = {Commodity Marketing - Strategies, Concepts, and Cases}, booktitle = {Commodity Marketing - Strategies, Concepts, and Cases}, editor = {Enke, Margit and Geigenm{\"u}ller, Anja and Leischnig, Alexander}, edition = {1st edition}, publisher = {Springer}, address = {Wiesbaden}, isbn = {978-3-030-90656-6}, issn = {2192-8096}, doi = {10.1007/978-3-030-90657-3_6}, pages = {105 -- 117}, abstract = {Many behavioral heuristics are fast and frugal ways for buyers to cope with uncertainty. Therefore, the extent to which pricing can rely on heuristic consumer reactions depends on the specifics and the extent of uncertainties in the market. In markets with a high degree of commoditization, uncertainties about the product are by definition low. However, as buyers are also uncertain about their own preferences, behavioral approaches can explain consumer reactions to price, even in a context of commoditization. In this chapter, we propose and test a dual process framework for pricing around buyers' reservation prices. Such a dual process includes both rational and heuristic modes of choice. According to our framework, reactions to prices are more or less influenced by heuristic choice, depending on their relation to a buyers' reservation price. This framework can explain the interrelations between rational and heuristic modes of choice, willingness-to-pay ranges, and latitudes of price acceptance. We also base a set of pricing and combined price-and-communication strategies on this framework. One interesting implication is that these pricing strategies are specific to target groups among buyers: as preferences and reservation prices are heterogeneous even in commodity markets, there are different potential buyers with a more rational or more heuristic mode of choice, for every price imaginable.}, language = {en} } @misc{IsaakWilkenDostetal., author = {Isaak, Karina and Wilken, Robert and Dost, Florian and B{\"u}rgin, David}, title = {Improving pricing scope through consumers' construal level - evidence based on consumers' willingness-to-pay ranges}, series = {Die Unternehmung}, volume = {74}, journal = {Die Unternehmung}, number = {4}, issn = {0042-059X}, doi = {10.5771/0042-059X-2020-4-365}, pages = {365 -- 383}, abstract = {How can the pricing scope be further leveraged in times of increased price transparency and growing price awareness on the consumer side? To answer this question, this paper uses the concept of willingness-to-pay ranges (as opposed to points). Three quantit� ative studies show that various marketing activities that allow con� sumers to assess a product on a more abstract (less concrete) level shift the upper limits of the intervals upwards and thus increase the scope for price setting. These (price) upper limits are particularly high when the central product advantages are emphasized.}, language = {en} }