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In the real world, buyer demand for a product can depend directly and indirectly on the marketing efforts of "other products" in different categories. The authors offer a behavioral rationale for the existence of the effects of "other products'" marketing efforts and propose a taxonomy of possible intercategory relationships. The discussion enables the authors to identify several promising new research directions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We employ the concept of goal-derived categories and examine when and why consideration sets might include alternatives from different nominal product categories. An experiment in stimulus-based choice was conducted wherein subjects were given a large, heterogeneous set of alternatives and asked to form consideration sets. A key finding was that across-category consideration was high when there was either goal conflict (i.e., a single product category could not deliver on all salient goals) or goal ambiguity (i.e., a lack of salient goals). However, goal-conflict and goal-ambiguity subjects engaged in across-category consideration for different reasons. Goal-conflict subjects potentially could have prioritized goals and eliminated entire categories prior to forming consideration sets. Instead, they formed mixed consideration sets in the service of salient goals and postponed conflict resolution to the final choice stage. Goal-ambiguity subjects, on the other hand, considered alternatives from different categories because they were influenced by extrinsic cues (e.g., leading brand names). Implications are discussed for consideration set formation and product-market structure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The authors report two studios investigating the effectiveness of a composite brand in a brand extension context. In composite brand extension, a combination of two existing brand names in different positions as header and modifier is used as the brand name for a new product (e.g., Slim- Fast chocolate cakemix by Godiva). The results of both studies reveal that by combining two brands with complementary attribute levels, a composite brand extension appears to have a better attribute profile than a direct extension of the header brand (Study 1) and has a better attribute profile when it consists of two complementary brands than when it consists of two highly favorable but not complementary brands (Study 2). The improved attribute profile seems to enhance a composite's effectiveness in influencing consumer choice and preference (Study 2). In addition, the positions of the constituent brand names in the composite brand name are found to be important in the formation of the composite's attribute profile and its feedback effects on the constituent brands. A composite brand extension has different attribute profiles and feedback effects, depending on the positions of the constituent brand names. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The relationship between the substitution in use approach to product-market structure and cognitive accounts of product category structures is investigated in terms of the role of product usage context. Studies 1 and 2 show that distinctive usages predict similarity judgments, whereas usage versatility predicts prototypically. The results of a third study suggest that individual usage contexts are associated with subcategories that involve restructuring of the overall category and, as such, guide context-specific product recall. Conceptual and managerial implications of the findings are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Multiattribute research in marketing seeks an understanding of the structure of customer decisions with respect to the market offerings of a firm and its competitors. Through such understanding the firm tries to evaluate and/or design its offerings for greater customer satisfaction and profitability. Recent applications of such research to new product evaluation and to concept generation are reviewed and critiqued, relevant methodologies are contrasted, and the import of this research trust for management is assessed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The attraction effect refers to an inferior product's ability to increase the attractiveness of another alternative when the inferior product is added to a choice set. This article examines potential explanations for the attraction effect end its boundary conditions. The article reports several empirical investigations and suggests that the attraction effect may be moderated by such variables as stimulus meaningfulness and familiarity with the product category. The implications are relevant to research on context effects in consumer choice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article critiques an article on market structure by Fraser and Bradford (FB) and examines FB's use of principle components analysis (PCA) for clustering. It states that FB's attempt to use panel data based on interpurchase time instead of brand switching incidents to develop a measure of brand substitutability. It suggests that the empirical application of FB's procedure did not adequately test the model's validity. It comments on the use of PCA to reproduce correlation matrices without the use of an underlying statistical model. It states that FB misinterpreted the results they found utilizing PCA. It suggests that FB's method shows idiosyncratic issues as well as containing general weaknesses found in every market structure analysis procedure.

In this paper, product usage data, employing a substitution-in-use criterion, are analyzed and shown to yield managerially useful product-market structures for financial services. These structures are identified through a form of hierarchical clustering which is different from traditional clustering routines in that it focuses on the explained or accounted for variance in the categorization of objects, thereby reducing groupings due to chance covariation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The need to identify the boundaries of increasingly complex product-markets has spawned a number of analytical methods based on customer behavior or judgments. The various methods are compared and contrasted according to whether they are consistent with a conceptual definition of a product-market, and their ability to yield diagnostic insights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A method is set forth by which a firm may measure and monitor, on a continuing basis, the priorities that different groups and individuals place upon a prespecified set of social goals. The article shows how the firm may then combine the differing viewpoints of these groups into a single set of priorities as a usable guide for decision-making.A method is set forth by which a firm may measure and monitor, on a continuing basis, the priorities that different groups and individuals place upon a prespecified set of social goals. The article shows how the firm may then combine the differing viewpoints of these groups into a single set of priorities as a usable guide for decision-making. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Incremental search heuristics do not identify the optimal solution to the media choice problem. With media discounts, such heuristics may not provide even a good approximation. This article discusses the reasons for this situation and considers several supplementary heuristics for improving the quality of solutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We consider customer influences on market structure, arguing that market structure should explain the extent to which any given set of market offerings are substitutes or complements. We describe recent additions to the market structure analysis literature and identify promising directions for new research in market structure analysis. Impressive advances in data collection, statistical methodology and information technology provide unique opportunities for researchers to build market structure tools that can assist "real-time" marketing decision making. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous studies dealing with product growth have dealt only with substitution effects among successive generations of one product category and not with complementarity and competition provided by related product categories. Based on a broadened concept of the competitive information technology (IT) market, we develop a dynamic market growth model that is able to incorporate both interproduct category and technological substitution effects simultaneously. The market potential for each category or generation is treated as a variable rather than a constant parameter, which is typical of recently growing IT sectors such as wireless telecommunications. The model is calibrated, its plausibility discussed, and its face and predictive validity assessed using data on wireless telecommunications services from two Asian markets. Results show that the market potential (and sales growth) of one category or generation is significantly affected by others and by the overall structure of a geographic market. The model is shown to make relatively good predictions even when the data from recently introduced categories/generations are limited. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In many purchase environments, consumers use information from a number of product categories prior to making a decision. These purchase situations create dependencies in choice outcomes across categories. As such, these decision problems cannot be easily modeled using the single-category, single-choice paradigm commonly used by researchers in marketing. We outline a conceptual framework for categorization, and then discuss three types of cross-category dependence: cross-category consideration cross-category learning, and product bundling. We argue that the key to modeling choice dependence across categories is knowledge of the goals driving consumer behavior. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We propose here a conceptual framework that incorporates a model of individual consumer behaviour into a theory of dynamic market behaviour. We first formalize a set of propositions about consumer behaviour wherein the key concept of an affordance is introduced and conceptual links between product, person and purpose are explicated. These behavioural foundations are then employed in a conceptual framework in which we examine dynamic market behaviour from the point of view of strategic marketing decisions. The framework stresses that exchange relationships between consumers and producers are built out of actions that are adaptive and purposive and that reciprocal influences are created when both buyers and suppliers are guided by their respective considerations of feasibility and desirability. We indicate how many current marketing ideas fit into our framework and we discuss key managerial implications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pretest marketing models are increasingly being used by consumer products firms for evaluating new products prior to test market. The reasons for tills are many, but include considerations of cost, risk, and fear of premature competitive disclosure. Allan Shocker and William Hall discuss the concept of a pretest market and assess its value. They contrast and critically evaluate four of the most frequently used models for projecting pretest market results. The strengths and limits of these models complement each other and provide useful additions w available methods for predicting new product performance and for refining marketing plans prior to test marketing. INSET: BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper affords a stylized view of individual consumer choice decision-making appropriate to the study of many marketing decisions. It summarizes issues relating to consideration set effects on consumer judgment and choice. It discusses whether consideration sets really exist and, if so, the factors that affect their composition, structure, and role in decision-making. It examines some new developments in the measurement and modeling of consideration set effects on decision-making. The paper concludes with suggestions for needed research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Four algorithms lot locating an "optimal" new product in a multiattribute product space--Albers and Brockhoff's PROPOPP: Gavish, Horsky, and Srikanth's Method IV: May and Sudharshan's PRODSRCH; and GRID SEARCH--are compared in terms of the relative share of preferences the new product will capture under different simulated market environments. These environments were both ones for which the algorithms were designed as well as other "more realistic" environments. Results indicate that algorithm performance is sensitive to the number of customers or segments, and the presence of probabilistic choice, and less sensitive to the numbers of existing products. Gavish, Horsky, and Srikanth IV (GHS IV) and PROPOPP performed best under the market conditions for which they were designed and GHS IV proved quite robust under variation from these conditions PROPOPP's performance deteriorated. however, in large sample size problems (n ≥ 200). PRODSRCII (a general purpose optimizer) was inferior trader these special market conditions, but superior under other more general ones. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article comments on measurement of utilities in conjoint analysis in marketing research citing its implications on the scaling of utilities by several computer programs as discussed in the article "Conjoint Utility Limits as Affected by Conjoint Design and Estimating Program," by Karson and Mullet. Specific errors on different algorithms and numbers made by Karson and Mullet were considered which may lead to misleading answers in market research programs. Evidently, if one needs to compare utilities, one should never compare single values from different attributes, simulations of product preference is recommended in using utilities and permissible rescalings may be necessary to apply conjoint utilities.

This paper suggests a procedure which analytically ties a model to predict users' predispositions to purchase different 'brands' in a product-market together with a search process to identify optimal new product ideas. Brands, conceptualized as attribute bundles, are located in a prespecified attribute space. The pairwise preference judgments of each individual in a representative sample drawn from the population of users are analyzed using the authors' LINMAP procedure (LINear programming techniques for Multidimensional Analysis of Preferences) to determine his ideal point and salience weights for the attributes of the space. A distance model of choice is postulated for each user and used to predict his probability of choosing nonexisting products. The models developed for each user are tied to methods for searching the product space to find "best" locations for new products. The proposed procedures are discussed and evaluated in the light of relevant conceptual and empirical research. The paper concludes with a discussion of additional applications of the behavioral framework of LINMAP to other marketing decision areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article presents an abstract on the LINMAP, the Linear Programming Techniques for the Multidimensional Analysis Preferences, developed by Allan D. Shocker of the University of Pittsburgh and V. Srinivasan of Stanford University in the U.S. The basic inputs are stimuli coordinates in a prespecified attribute space and the ordinal preference judgments of one or more judges. Virtually all input data are also output wherein preference judgments are summarized for multiple judgments. The computer program uses the Fortran IV programming language.

This article focuses on a simulation comparison of methods for new product location. The value of analytic approaches to product idea generation lies in the fact that they are market based. Although a mere recitation of possible shortcomings in the market model cannot prove that analytic search will not be as productive as other means for idea generation, the authors believe that their value to managers would be improved by efforts to characterize markets more "realistically." In their paper the authors speculate that PRODSRCH and GRID SEARCH could ultimately prove the more useful of the methods compared because they are more flexible and can accommodate many of the suggestions for improving the realism of market models. Research is necessary not only to investigate which improvements to realism offer the greater promise, but also how to go about incorporating such changes. Modeling competitive action and reaction, finding ways to predict changes in market size and structure as the result of product additions, developing means for predicting the behavior of costs as a consequence of product location, predicting the attractiveness of attributes or features which do not at present characterize existing products, determining when the addition or deletion of a feature Will change the definition of a market or its structure, and the like represent major challenges for future research.