Word-of-Mouth Communication and Percolation in Social Networks

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Campbell, Arthur
• 署名单位: Yale University
• 刊物名称: AMERICAN ECONOMIC REVIEW
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0002-8282
• DOI: 10.1257/aer.103.6.2466
• 发表日期: 2013
• 页码: 2466-2498
• 关键词: diffusion; conversations; INFLUENTIALS; uncertainty; PRODUCTS; CHOICE; sales; GOODS; MODEL

摘要

This paper develops a model of demand, pricing and advertising in the presence of social learning via word-of-mouth communication between friends. In the model consumers must receive information about a monopolist's product in order to consider purchasing it. The presence of word-of-mouth is not sufficient for demand to be more elastic and prices to be lower compared to an informed population. I derive the comparative static results of connectivity, mean-preserving spread of friendships, and clustering of friends on prices. The optimal targets for advertising are not, generically, the individuals with the most friends.