定价决策对企业的成功运营至关重要。目前,企业逐渐认识到消费者行为对其定价决策的重要性。本文聚焦于订阅服务、直播渠道以及产品线设计的场景。在这些场景中,消费者行为跨越了多个时间段,且不同时间段中环境存在差异,因此他们会展现出时间不一致行为。本文探讨了这些行为如何影响企业的定价决策。 首先,本文聚焦于订阅服务下消费者的沉没成本偏差效应,消费者认知上的朴素性使其低估了沉没成本偏差效应产生了时间不一致行为,从而在订阅后更有意愿进行消费。在考虑消费者的使用次数和对沉没成本偏差认知的朴素性这两个维度的异质性的情况下,本文研究了订阅服务的最优定价。相较于按次收费,订阅服务使得企业在消费者展现出冲动消费行为后获得了盈利水平的提升,但也使得企业在消费者使用次数方面存在信息不对称的劣势。本文比较了这两种定价模式,探讨了企业提供订阅服务的最优时机。 然后,本文聚焦于直播环境下消费者展现的双重自我行为。时间不一致性体现在消费者在直播渠道内基于体验自我进行冲动消费,但在进入直播渠道之前和在离开直播渠道之后,基于记忆自我决定是否进入渠道和是否退货。直播渠道在创造冲动消费氛围之外,还提供了关于产品更加充分的信息。在考虑信息与冲动消费的权衡下,本文分析了企业在直播渠道的定价决策,并与传统电商渠道进行了比较。针对不同的产品类型,本文挖掘了直播渠道的盈利机会。 最后,本文聚焦于产品线设计中消费者的自我控制行为,研究了企业在随机需求下的最优菜单式定价。面对冲动需求时,消费者为了克服丰富的选择带来的诱惑会存在自我控制成本,其中,朴素消费者事前对于冲动需求的低估产生了时间不一致行为。为了从消费者事后超额消费中获利,企业可以在菜单中提供具有较高产品数量的选项,但这一方面会提高消费者事前自我控制成本;另一方面,企业也需要考虑高昂的生产成本。研究发现,企业的定价策略之一是在菜单中提供免费样品,作用在于缓和消费者的自我控制成本。这一结论不仅印证了现有企业实践,而且拓展了有关免费样品管理启示的文献。 本文丰富了运营管理领域中对消费者时间不一致的行为的研究,创新性地考察了消费者认知上朴素程度异质性对企业定价策略的影响。综合以上三项研究工作,本文得到的管理启示有助于企业在运营管理实践中制定更有效的决策。
Pricing decisions are a critical aspect of a business‘s operational success. In recent years, an increasing number of companies have recognized the impact of consumer behavior on pricing decisions. The dissertation focuses on contexts of subscription services, live-streaming channels and product line design; under these contexts, consumer behavior is a multi-stage process and environments may vary in different stages, therefore, consumers perform time-inconsistently. The dissertation studies how consumers‘ time-inconsistent behavior influence companies‘ pricing decisions. Firstly, the dissertation explores consumers‘ sunk cost bias effect under subscription services. Consumers‘ naivete makes them underestimate the impact of sunk cost bias, resulting in time-inconsistent behavior, which implies consumers are more likely to purchase after subscribing. The dissertation investigates optimal subscription decisions for companies by considering the two-dimensional heterogeneity of consumer usage frequency and the naivete of sunk cost bias. This study finds that compared to pay-per-use services, subscription services enhance companies‘ profitability by leveraging consumers‘ overconsumption but also create an information asymmetry disadvantage concerning consumer usage frequency. The comparison results provide insights for companies to choose subscription services. Secondly, the dissertation examines consumers‘ dual-selves behavior in the context of live-streaming. Time inconsistency in the live-streaming setting refers that consumers making impulsive purchases based on the experiencing self during live-streaming events, while they make decisions of visiting channels or returning the product based on the remembering self before or after live-streaming events, respectively. In addition to creating an atmosphere of impulsive purchase, live-streaming channels also provide sufficient product information. Considering the trade-off between information and impulse purchase, the dissertation analyzes the pricing decisions of companies in live-streaming channels and compares them with those of traditional e-commerce channels. For different types of products, the findings indicate profit opportunities of live-streaming channels. Thirdly, the dissertation focuses on consumers‘ self-control behavior in the context of the product line design and studies companies‘ optimal menu pricing under stochastic demand. Facing tempted demand and combating temptation from rich options, consumers demonstrate non-negative self-control costs. Naive consumers‘ ex-ante underestimation about their tempted demand leads to time-inconsistent behavior. Providing an option with higher product quantities enables companies to benefit from consumers‘ overconsumption but also increases consumers‘ ex-ante self-control costs; besides, such an option also leads to higher production costs. Results show that one of the optimal menus includes a free sample, which mitigates consumers‘ self-control costs and makes store visits appealing. This finding corroborates existing business practices and extends managerial implications for free sampling. The dissertation contributes to the field of operations management by examining consumers‘ time-inconsistent behavior and incorporating naivete heterogeneity into firms‘ pricing decisions. Drawing from the three studies, the dissertation provides valuable insights for companies to make effective decisions in the operational context.