Media Management and Economics 2013 Abstracts
Motion Picture Firms’ Strategic Use of Product Placement: An Examination of Intrinsic and Extrinsic Cues • Jiyoung Cha, George Mason University • This study examines intrinsic and extrinsic factors that impact motion picture firms’ product placement and differences among major distributors in terms of their strategic use of product placement using a sample of 398 movies. Results suggest that intrinsic cues are more important than extrinsic factors in predicting the number of product placements in a movie. Specifically, the number of product placements in a movie depends on the genre, distributor type, rating, and brand extension.
Social Media as Branding Tools: Exploring the Relationship between Perceived Social Media Use and Brand Relationship • Sylvia Chan-Olmsted, University of Florida; Moonhee Cho, University of South Florida • The purpose of this study is to examine the role of social media in cultivating brand relationship and brand equity. An online panel study results showed that the effect of a brand’s social media use on brand equity is mediated by consumers’ perceived relationship investment of the brand. The study also found that consumer and product characteristics moderate the relationship between the perceived social media use of a brand and the PRI of the brand.
Less is Better? The Impact of Reduced Newspaper Publication Schedule on Advertising Revenue • H. Iris Chyi, University of Texas at Austin; James Ian Tennant, University of Texas at Austin • To address an ongoing debate regarding the impact of reducing newspaper publication schedules as a cost-saving measure, this study proposed two analytical models and, based on a national survey of 198 U.S. college newspapers, conducted empirical tests to estimate the plausible effect on advertising revenue. Results indicated a substantial loss in both scenarios, which may cause some proponents of a reduced print schedule to pause before implementing such a measure.
Diffuse Competition and the Decline in Newspaper Advertising • John Dimmick, School of Communication, Ohio State University • The paper introduces a concept called diffuse competition and relates measures of this phenomenon for the decline in newspapers share of all advertising. Although it has been suggested that competition is responsible for this decline, this paper provides the first actual measurement such competition. Time series regression shows a statistically significant negative relationship between the degree of diffuse competition and newspapers share of advertising. The paper also uses curvilinear regression to assess the impact of diffuse competition on newspaper classified advertising. It is suggested that in the current media environment diffuse competition may have more explanatory power than pairwise competition.
Antecedents and Consequences of Social Television Viewing with Network Primetime Programming • Miao Guo, Ball State University • This study investigated viewers’ social television viewing experience by introducing social engagement construct. Three categories of predictors from the perspectives of television program perceptions, social media characteristics, and audience attributes were proposed to predict the social engagement experience. Four possible consequences of the social television viewing experience were tested. The analyses identified ten motives for using social media to engage with television content. The findings further illustrated that the social engagement process is a composite result, which is determined by multiple components jointly. In particular, program-related factors (e.g., program affinity, program involvement, and genre preferences) as well as the individuals’ innovativeness attributes are suggested to predict the social television viewing experience. This study further discovered that social engagement has significant impacts on program attitudinal and behavioral loyalty, audience satisfaction, and product purchase likelihood.
Who’s Minding the Station? An Exploration of Shared Service Agreements within U.S. Local Television Markets • Kevin Hull, University of Florida; Amy Jo Coffey, University of Florida • In a struggling economy, some television station owners have turned to shared services agreements (SSAs) to keep their stations afloat, despite concerns that such business arrangements may violate FCC ownership policy. A national sample of local television stations (N=270) was analyzed to determine the proportion of shared services agreements existing within the United States. Findings reveal that mid-sized markets are the most common locations for such arrangements. Implications for news audiences and industry are addressed.
A Comparative Study: Hollywood and Korean Sequel Films’ Performance in Korea • Dam Hee Kim, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor • Despite the economic and cultural importance, the film industry is notorious for its high risk. To cope with high risk, film studios often make sequels of highly successful films. Also, while in most countries domestic films’ share is decreasing under the strong influence of Hollywood films, South Korea is one of the few countries where domestic films are preferred over Hollywood films. Noting most studies examined determinants for films’ success focused on the U.S., this paper analyzed all Hollywood and domestic films released from 2003 to 2007 in Korea to investigate what types of films were successful. Sequel films attracted more viewers than non-sequels, and newly named sequels attracted even more viewers than numbered sequels. Also, Korean domestic films attracted more viewers than Hollywood films, perhaps due to the improvement in Korean films’ quality, Hollywood studios’ inexperienced local marketing in Korea, illegal downloading of Hollywood films, and Screen Quota.
When Ideology Meets Bottom Line • Seok Ho Lee, University of Texas at Austin • This study explores how newspapers use ideological bias as a strategy of product differentiation in intense market competition, with cases of South Korean conservative daily newspapers. The evidence demonstrates that conservative newspapers tend to use ideological labeling against the liberal more frequently as the competition among newspapers becomes intense, and ideological mood of conservative groups becomes greater. The results suggest that market pressure is a strong indicator for newspapers’ ideological bias.
The emergence and development of hyperlocal news websites: An organization ecology approach • Wilson Lowrey • The organization ecology approach, with its emphasis on legitimacy, mimicry and dependency on past paths taken, offers a helpful framework for assessing budding trends, or even fads. The “hyperlocal news” phenomenon, which emerged in earnest in the mid 2000s, is a good example. The present study examines the quick emergence and development of the hyperlocal news website from within the framework of the organization ecology model. More than 800 operative and defunct hyperlocal sites, sampled from three different databases, were examined for population growth patterns, and correlation between growth and public legitimacy. A smaller sample was examined for evidence of growing mimicry during population growth, and for tendencies toward an institutional orientation over time. In addition, impact of community context was explored. Findings showed that the hyperlocal population development pattern differed somewhat from traditional patterns, with a steeper rise in density. Population development correlated with a rise in public legitimacy of the hyperlocal form, as predicted by the organization ecology model. The hyperlocal population also showed an increased institutional orientation over time, with more ads, more staff, more frequent use of official sources, and more attention to writing errors. Sites showed some evidence of path dependency and increased isomorphism over time (sameness with one another).
Bounded Rationality and Consumer Choice: An Evaluation of Consumer Choice of Mobile Bundles • Miao Miao, Southwest Jiaotong University; Krishna Jayakar, Penn State University • As a potential means of attracting more consumers and increasing average revenues per user, product bundling has become a widespread business strategy in every type of industry. Though numerous prior studies have examined consumer valuation, consumer surplus, and the relative distribution of social welfare in bundling transactions from a theoretical perspective, there have been relatively few empirical analyses with large datasets; the few available papers utilize very small data sets, usually less than 100 customers. In addition, no prior research has targeted the Chinese telecommunication market. To address these problems, we examined the rationality of consumers’ bundling choice in the mobile telecommunication industry using operational data from China Telecom, one of China’s largest mobile telecommunications providers. We use a value model for assessing the rationality of consumer bundling choice, which compares the pricing for a consumer’s amount of usage in talk time, short message service (SMS) and Internet surfing time under the current bundle, and available alternative bundles. We assess the degree of risk aversion inherent in consumer choice by comparing the optimal bundling plan to their chosen bundle for each individual customer, and estimate the influence of factors such as gender, age, user level, etc. The findings suggest significant differences between customers in terms of their choice in telecommunication bundling. The evaluation suggests that many users did not select their optimal bundle, given their usage levels; in general, they paid more than they should. Additionally, the results show that there were no significant differences by gender, age or usage level on decision making. Prior research has suggested that service providers too can benefit from enabling consumers to choose appropriate bundles and service levels through higher retention rates and reduced churn. The recommendations of this paper will therefore be of interest to consumers as well as mobile telecommunications firms.
Do extended brands affect parent brands?: Focusing on feedback effect and expectation-disconfirmation theory • Sang-Ki Baek; Byeng-Hee Chang; Sang-Hyun Nam • The present study constructed the research model about the feedback effects of brand extension and researched the extended channels through South Korean newspapers. It adopted the expectation disconfirmation theory for expansion of brand extension-related theory. The present study constructed 5 latent variables, which are, ‘extended channel evaluation before extension’, ‘parent brand evaluation’, ‘perceived performance’, ‘expectation disconfirmation’ and ‘extended channel evaluation after extension’, and 1 moderate variable, ‘perceived fit’. In the results, the present study found new information that perceived performance affects parent brand evaluation through the extended channel brand evaluation after extension, and expectation disconfirmation negatively affects parent brand evaluation in low perceived fit. It was known that expectation disconfirmation can affect parent brand evaluation regardless the perceived fit(Ed. note: Unclear. Do you mean, ‘of perceived fit’? Please confirm). Finally, we verified that expectation disconfirmation might differ by levels of perceived fit as the expectation disconfirmation theory. We discussed theoretical contributions for the feedback effects of brand extension and the expectation disconfirmation theory, and practical implications.
Windowed Distribution Strategies for Substitutive Television Content: An Audience-Centric Typology • Ronen Shay, University of Florida • An audience-centric typology is proposed to assist media mangers implementing windowed distribution strategies in an attempt to curtail media consumption cannibalization. Diffusion theory identifies the demographics most likely to consume substitutive television content, while uses, gratifications, media habits, and consumption values are collaboratively used to re-segment the audiences based on platform selection motivators. Psychographic labels are then applied using the dominant characteristic of each audience type and then correlated to a specific windowed distribution strategy.
Lost in Transition; Managing convergence at regional newspapers • Marco Van Kerkhoven, Utrecht School of Journalism; Klaus Schönbach • We investigate to what extent and how Dutch regional newspapers implement and manage convergence strategies. Thirty managers, editors and market experts at all six regional newspaper publishers were interviewed. At least 27 factors were mentioned as having a critical impact on the potential success of the transition towards convergence. However, while most regional dailies experiment with convergence, they hardly invest in reskilling journalists or in new content concepts. We conclude that the management of regional newspapers in the Netherlands tends to operate safely. A lack of successful examples and good ideas seem to play a role in the hesitation to invest.
Examining the Effect of Innovation on the Market Structure of the U.S. Media Industry • Tom Vizcarrondo • This study examines if and how technological innovation influences market structure of the media industry. OLS regression analysis is employed to address the following research question: How do technological innovations affect the market structure of the media industry? Results suggest that changes in the adoption rates of television and cable television influence changes in the media industry’s market structure. The study discusses implications of these findings, and recommends future related research efforts.
Bandwagon Effects of Popularity Information on Audience’s Media Product Selection: Information Load and Cultural Unfamiliarity • Xuexin Xu; Wei-Jen Wayne Fu • Building on information cascade theory and dual-process theories, this study examines bandwagon effects of product-popularity information on audience’s media product selection. It further examines whether the strength of bandwagon effects is stimulated by how uncertain people are about the quality of the content offerings. An analysis of box office sales of Hollywood movies in 73 countries during 2003 – 2007 is conducted. The results confirm the presence of bandwagon effects and the influence of quality uncertainty.
Is Online News Still An Inferior Good? Re-Examining The Economic Nature of Online News and Print Newspapers • Mengchieh Jacie Yang, Texas State University • Newspaper companies in the United States face declining print revenue but monetizing online content remains challenging. Research has found news consumers generally have low intent to pay for online news, they hold somewhat negative attitudes toward online news, and they have loose emotional attachments to online news. These reasons led to analysis indicating that online news is an inferior good. This study sought to re-examine the economic nature of online news and print newspapers with dataset collected by the Pew Research Center in 2012. The results did not support the hypotheses. In other words, online news is no longer an inferior good and the print newspaper is no longer a normal good. Important theoretical and practical implications are discussed.
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