To encourage more and higher-quality content, some knowledge platforms have started to pay contributors. It is unclear, however, whether and how such monetary incentives affect users’ contribution to non-paid (“free”) knowledge activities. Answering this question is important because consumers benefit from both paid and non-paid knowledge. We study the ... Read More

The rise of social media platforms, such as Twitter, in the past decade, has turned personal branding (PB) into a powerful technology within the reach of almost everyone. However, whether PB on social media can improve a candidate’s standing among other equally qualified candidates remains unclear. Using personal branding, individuals strategically present ... Read More

Why do some professionals use so much jargon? Jargon is a status signal associated with professional expertise and status. Thus, experts should always use more jargon, right? Wrong. Our research shows that lower status professionals routinely use jargon to show off or compensate for lower status. They are using excessive jargon not to be understood but ... Read More

Viral marketing can be a cost-effective marketing tool to create awareness and reach many new customers. Viral marketing relies on word of mouth and leverages social networks of individuals to spread information. But, what is the optimal seeding strategy? Put differently: who should you target to initiate a viral marketing campaign? Previous research ... Read More

Organizations and governments alike have increasingly embraced nudges: small changes to the decision environment that can influence the choices people make. A utility company promoting energy conservation can redesign its bill to include comparisons to more efficient households, nudging households to reduce their energy consumption. Firms that want to help ... Read More

Many innovative products are designed to satisfy the demand of specific target consumers; thus, the innovators will inevitably compete with each other in the product market. We investigate how a profit-maximizing principal should properly allocate her limited resources to support the innovations of multiple potentially competing innovators. We find that ... Read More

We are interested in understanding how credit crises spread through the real economy. To this end we focus on an understudied aspect of financial crises, the effect of borrowers' defaults on the contracts the bank writes with other borrowers. In a crisis this is one means by which restrictive credit environments pass from borrower to borrower. We provide ... Read More

Modern technology has brought us unprecedented access to information. We can exchange ideas with people all over the world, monitor the performance of our investment portfolios in real-time, and learn about our risks of developing a variety of medical conditions long before experiencing any symptoms. And yet, many do not avail themselves of this information ... Read More

Despite its immense popularity, the freemium business model remains a complex strategy to master and often a topic of heated debate. In this research, we ask when and why a firm should offer a zero price on its low-end product when users’ product usages generate network effects on each other. Without network effects, freemium never emerges as optimal, and the ... Read More

What are the best incentives to recruit more productive (entry-level) workers? The difficulty in effective screening of job applicants is one of the key drivers of low labor productivity. Firms often consider financial incentives such as high salary or bonus as well as career incentives such as tenure and promotion. We study how career and wage incentives ... Read More