Publications

winter 2009
Journal Article

Interactivity's Unanticipated Consequences for Markets and Marketing

By: John A. Deighton and Leora Kornfeld

The digital interactive transformation in marketing is not unfolding, as some thought it would, on the model of direct marketing. That model anticipated that marketing, empowered by digital media using rich profiling data, would intrude ever more deeply and more... View Details

Keywords: Communication Intention and Meaning; Interactive Communication; Marketing Communications; Consumer Behavior; Social and Collaborative Networks; Online Technology

June 1974 (Revised April 1983)
Background Note

Note on Marketing Arithmetic and Related Marketing Terms

By: James L. Heskett and Theodore Levitt

A basic note to be used at the beginning of the introductory marketing course to familiarize students with the arithmetic techniques, concepts, and terms that are typically employed in the analysis of a first year marketing case. View Details

Keywords: Marketing

June 2024
Article

Oral History and Business History in Emerging Markets

By: Geoffrey Jones

This article describes the motivation, structure and use of the Creating Emerging Markets (CEM) oral history-based project at the Harvard Business School. The project consists of lengthy interviews with business leaders from emerging markets. By June 2024 183... View Details

Keywords: Emerging Economies; Oral History; Emerging Markets; Business History; Research

11 Oct 2011
Working Paper Summaries

US Healthcare Reform and the Pharmaceutical Industry

Keywords: by Arthur Daemmrich; Pharmaceutical; Health

February 2018
Article

Auctions versus Posted Prices in Online Markets

By: Liran Einav, Chiara Farronato, Jonathan Levin and Neel Sundaresan

Auctions were very popular in the early days of internet commerce, but today online sellers mostly use posted prices. We model the choice between auctions and posted prices as a trade-off between competitive price discovery and convenience. Evidence from eBay fits the... View Details

Keywords: Internet and the Web; Auctions; Price

01 May 2008
Research & Ideas

The Marketing Challenges of the China Olympics

Editor's Note: Harvard Business School professor John Quelch writes a blog on marketing issues, called Marketing Know: How, for Harvard Business Online. It is reprinted on HBS Working Knowledge.Normally,... View Details

Keywords: by John Quelch; Sports

01 Jun 2009
News

The Maestro and the Market

experiences, you almost can’t listen to the customer.” Norton asks students to consider the operations and marketing of elBulli. There is much about View Details

Keywords: Julia Hanna; Performing Arts, Spectator Sports, and Related Industries; Arts, Entertainment; Colleges, Universities, and Professional Schools; Educational Services; Food Services and Drinking Places; Hospitality

September 2016
Article

History-based versus Uniform Pricing in Growing and Declining Markets

By: Oz Shy, Rune Stenbacka and David Hao Zhang

We analyze the Markov Perfect Equilibria of an infinite-horizon overlapping generations model with consumer lock-in to compare the performance of history-based and uniform pricing in growing and declining markets. Under history-based pricing, firms charge higher prices... View Details

Keywords: History-based Pricing; Introductory Discount; Uniform Pricing; Consumer Lock-in; High Switching Costs; Demand and Consumers; Competition; Price; Market Entry and Exit; Product Marketing

20 May 2013
Research & Ideas

The Long-Term Fix to US Competitiveness

is that people who should be allies are at cross-purposes with each other." The US Competitiveness Project put forth this definition: "The United States is a competitive nation to View Details

Keywords: by Stephanie Schorow & Harvard Gazette

19 Nov 2014
HBS Case

Marketing Marijuana

available shortly, Marketing Marijuana in Colorado, Harvard Business School marketing professor John A. Quelch and coauthor David Lane look at lessons from View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding; Food & Beverage

February 2008
Course Overview Note

Conceptual Overview of Real Estate Options in Emerging Markets

By: Nicolas P. Retsinas and Ben Creo

A conceptual overview of real estate investments in emerging markets and descriptions of suggested modules, cases, and discussion questions for a course on this topic. Intended for instructors, this overview describes the nature of emerging markets and how real estate... View Details

Keywords: Emerging Markets; Investment; Situation or Environment; Cases; Curriculum and Courses; Real Estate Industry

Article

Creating Ecotourism in Costa Rica, 1970–2000

By: Geoffrey Jones and Andrew Spadafora

Between the 1970s and the 2000s, Costa Rica became established as the world’s leading ecotourism destination. This article argues that although Costa Rica benefited from biodiversity and a pleasant climate, the country’s preeminence in ecotourism requires more than a... View Details

Keywords: Ecotourism; Entrepreneurship In Emerging Markets; Sustainable Business And Innovation; Tourism; Green Business; Entrepreneurship; Growth and Development; History; Business History; Tourism Industry; Latin America; Costa Rica

January 2019 (Revised January 2021)
Case

KITEA (A): Democratizing Furniture in Morocco

By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell and Gamze Yucaoglu

The case opens in 2013 as Amine Benkirane, founder and CEO of the leading Moroccan furniture company KITEA, contemplates the loss his company has incurred for the first time in its 20-year history. The case then describes KITEA’s origins and provides a detailed... View Details

2008
Working Paper

Competition and Resource Sensitivity in Marriage and Roommate Markets

By: Bettina-Elisabeth Klaus

We consider one-to-one matching markets in which agents can either be matched as pairs or remain single. In these so-called roommate markets agents are consumers and resources at the same time. We investigate two new properties that capture the effect a newcomer has on... View Details

Keywords: Competition; Marketplace Matching

July 2012
Article

The Real Consequences of Market Segmentation

By: Sergey Chernenko and Adi Sunderam

We study the real effects of market segmentation due to credit ratings using a matched sample of firms just above and just below the investment-grade cutoff. These firms have similar observables, including average investment rates. However, flows into high-yield mutual... View Details

Keywords: Segmentation; Credit; Investment; Investment Funds; Quality; Markets; Measurement and Metrics; Business Ventures

We present evidence that high concentration in mortgage lending reduces the sensitivity of mortgage rates and refinancing activity to mortgage-backed security (MBS) yields. We isolate the direct effect of concentration and rule out alternative explanations in two ways.... View Details

November 2020 (Revised May 2023)
Case

Holaluz: Taking on the Spanish Energy Market

By: Elie Ofek, Marco Bertini, Oded Koenigsberg, Elena Corsi and Emer Moloney

In 2020, the three cofounders of Holaluz, a newcomer to Spain’s electricity retail market, are preparing to launch a new offering: installing and managing solar panels on households' roofs at no extra cost for the consumer, who would still benefit from the energy... View Details

Keywords: Electricity; Solar Power; Subscription Business; Renewable Energy; Entrepreneurship; Service Delivery; Business Model; Product Launch; Marketing; Energy Industry; Spain