Johannes Bauer
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Bauer
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Johannes
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johannes.bauer@unisg.ch
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+41 71 224 7192
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Gamifying the digital shopping experience: games without monetary participation incentives increase customer satisfaction and loyalty

2020-08 , Bauer, Johannes Christian , Linzmajer, Marc , Nagengast, Liane , Rudolph, Thomas , D'Cruz, Elena

Purpose Many marketplace examples suggest that using gamification in the online retail shopping context boosts sales and positively affects customer loyalty. Nevertheless, more research is needed to understand the effects of digital games on consumer behavior and their underlying psychological mechanisms. Therefore, this article explores how combining games and monetary rewards impacts customer satisfaction, loyalty and word-of-mouth (WOM) intentions. Design/methodology/approach To test our hypotheses, we designed two online laboratory experiments to stimulate an online shopping situation, as gamification in online retailing has the potential to affect an important set of outcomes for service firms throughout the consumer decision process (Hofacker et al., 2016). Findings The results of two lab experiments demonstrate that playing a shopping-related game without monetary participation incentive positively influences all three relational outcomes because games enhance consumers' enjoyment of the overall shopping experience. However, our findings also show that monetary rewards used to incentivize game participation diminish these effects. Gamification loses its positive effects if games are combined with monetary rewards, as consumers no longer play games to derive inherent enjoyment, but rather the extrinsic motivation of receiving a discount. We draw managerial implications about how gamification effectively and profitably fosters strong customer relationships and thus increases customer lifetime value and equity. Research limitations/implications This research is the first to investigate the combined effects of gamification and price discounts that require consumers to play the game in order to receive the discount. Focusing on an online shopping context, this article contributes to research on motivation by providing new and more nuanced insights into the psychological process underlying the gamification effects on consumer' long-term attitudes (i.e. satisfaction) and relational behaviors (i.e. positive WOM and loyalty) toward a retailer. Practical implications Based on our findings, we provide recommendations for marketers that explain how gamification can be a profitable and efficient tool to foster strong customer relationships. Retail managers should use gamification as a less costly alternative to typical price discounts. Originality/value Two laboratory experiments investigate how the separate and combined use of games and price discounts affects consumers' satisfaction, positive WOM intentions and loyalty. Playing a shopping-related game increases satisfaction with the retailer and positive WOM intentions as well as loyalty. Monetary rewards used to incentivize game participation eliminate the positive effects of gamification.

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Publication

Die Rolle der Kunden im Category Management : Ein Einblick in die mentalen Denkstrukturen von Category Managern

2010-08-01 , Rudolph, Thomas , Bauer, Johannes C. , Nagengast, Liane , Einhorn, Martin

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Money Given Away is More Valuable

2016-02-25 , Nagengast, Liane , Bauer, Johannes C. , Norton, Michael

Across various disciplines, research has analyzed the effectiveness of self-focused vs. other-focused (prosocial) bonuses in influencing individual behavior. The effectiveness of prosocial bonuses has been linked to the “warm glow” of giving, which suggests that people experience positive feelings from the act of “doing good”. We propose an additional motivation for why prosocial bonuses might influence behaviors, suggesting that peoples’ value perceptions differ depending on whether an equivalent bonus is spent on others or on oneself. Two laboratory experiments show that individuals overvalue other-focused compared to self-focused bonuses. These results have implications for the design of incentive schemes.

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Price Framing Effects in Consumers' Choices of Customizable Product and Service Bundles

2015-05-27 , Bauer, Johannes C. , Böttger, Tim

Many retailers and service providers offer consumers the opportunity to tailor products and services to their individual preferences. During the customization process of a service bundle (e.g., smartphone), consumers typically have to make a choice for each bundle component (e.g., a choice for minutes, SMS, and data). In this research, we will provide evidence that customers' satisfaction with the final bundle configuration is determined by (1) whether the choice options for the bundle components are presented and decision are made simultaneously (all at the same time) versus sequentially (once at a time) and (2) the price communication tactics used in the configuration process (aggregate bundle price vs. aggregate bundle price and segregated prices for the choice options). The experiment presented in this paper provides evidence for the psychological process involved and discusses directions for future research.

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Managerial Decision Making in Customer Management: Adaptive, Fast and Frugal?

2013-06 , Bauer, Johannes C. , Schmitt, Philipp , Morwitz, Vicki G. , Winer, Russell S.

While customer management has become a top priority for practitioners and academics, little is known about how managers actually make customer management decisions. Our study addresses this gap and uses the adaptive decision maker as well as the fast and frugal heuristics frameworks to gain a better understanding of managerial decision making. Using the process-tracing tool MouselabWEB, we presented sales managers in retail banking with three typical customer management prediction tasks. The results show that a majority of managers in this study are adaptive in their decision making and that some managers use fast and frugal heuristics. Usage of adaptive decision making seems to be mainly driven by low objective task difficulty, the use of fast and frugal heuristics by experience. While adaptive decision making does not impact predictive accuracy, usage of fast and frugal heuristics is associated with proportionally greater use of high predictive quality cues and a significant increase in accuracy. Hence, the existing skepticism concerning heuristics should be questioned.

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Preis-Promotion-Framing : Ein Überblick zum Stand der Forschung

2010-03 , Rudolph, Thomas , Bauer, Johannes C. , Steiner, W. J.

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Price Framing and Choice Order Effects in Bundle Customization Decision

2015-10-02 , Bauer, Johannes C. , Böttger, Tim

This research demonstrates that consumers' satisfaction with a customizable bundle depends on (1) whether the choice options for the bundle components are presented simultaneously or sequentially and (2) whether (or not) detailed segregated prices for all choice options are provided in addition to the total price of the bundle configuration.

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What Constitutes a ‘‘Good Assortment''? A Scale for Measuring Consumers' Perceptions of an Assortment Offered in a Grocery Category

2012-01-01 , Bauer, Johannes C. , Kotouc, Alexander J. , Rudolph, Thomas

This research investigates how consumers form subjective judgments of what constitutes "a good grocery assortment". By conducting three exploratory focus groups and a field study, we develop a multi-item scale that reflects consumers' cue utilization processes in forming perceptions of a grocery assortment. Our findings suggest that consumers use only a limited number of informational cues to form perceptions about four higher-level assortment dimensions: (1) the assortment's pricing, (2) its quality, (3) its variety, and (4) its presentation. In line with the attitude theory, we found that consumers integrate these higher-level assortment dimensions into a summary evaluation of the grocery category's attractiveness. Accordingly, we derive the grocery assortment perception (GAP) scale as a second-order construct composed of four first-order factors. Significant positive relationships between the GAP scale and customer satisfaction as well as loyalty intentions provide empirical support for the scale's predictive ability and nomological validity. In the last section of this article, we discuss how the GAP scale will support category managers in their assortment decisions and provide directions for further research.

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Retailing in Switzerland - Player, Strategies and Developments

2009-11-18 , Morschett, Dirk , Rudolph, Thomas , Bauer, Johannes C. , Donath, Annett , Meise, Niklas

Retailing in Switzerland differs significantly from its European neighbours. The major reasons for these differences are trade-barriers, governmental regulations and certain consumer specifications.This paper introduces the main players in the Swiss grocery and non-food retail market. It shows current developments of concentration and market entrance of foreign retailers. As the Swiss retail market is highly saturated, there is little room for expansion within Switzerland. The consequent responses in the grocery sector are increasing competition between the established Swiss players and German hard discount retailers; vertical expansion into the production level of the food industry; and slight internationalisation tendencies. With the grocery sector being protected by trade barriers, the paper further presents the situation in non-food retailing, which is open to European competitors. Consequently, foreign players are much more present and stronger in the non-food sector.

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Price Framing and Choice Order Effects in Bundle Customization Decisions

2015-07-17 , Bauer, Johannes C. , Böttger, Tim

One-to-one marketing has become increasingly popular in the consumer product and service industry. Customization emerged as a marketing trend and allows consumers to proactively participate in the configuration or production process by choosing one or more elements of the marketing mix (Arora et al. 2008). Today, consumers can customize a wide variety of products and services. For example, Dell Computers allows customers to choose the hardware components (e.g., processor, RAM, hard drive, etc.) which best fits their needs when buying a new laptop. By offering consumers the opportunity to tailor products and services to their individual preferences, needs, and budgets, firms aim to differentiate themselves from competitors, increase customer satisfaction, and generate loyalty (Arora et al. 2008). During the customization process of a service bundle (e.g., smartphone plan), consumers typically have to make a series of choices, one for each bundle component (e.g., a choice for minutes, SMS, and data). In this research, we will provide evidence that consumers' satisfaction with the final bundle configuration, bundle price perceptions, and overall spending amounts are determined by (1) whether the choice options for the bundle components are presented all at the same time and decision are made simultaneously versus sequentially (i.e., only the options of one bundle component are presented and choices for each component are made step-by-step) and (2) the price framing used in the configuration process (aggregate bundle price as a running total versus aggregate bundle price together with the detailed option prices). The results of two online experiments show that consumers' are more satisfied with the outcome of the customization process and less price sensitive if only the aggregate bundle price (i.e., the running total) is advertised in simultaneous (versus sequential) customization processes. In contrast, when decisions for each bundle component were made step-by-step, consumers' are more satisfied and less price sensitive if detailed option prices are provided in addition to the aggregate bundle price. Our two studies also shed some light into the psychological process that underlies consumers' different reactions. Besides contributing to consumer decision making and behavioral pricing research, our findings have important implications for service providers on how to design a bundle configuration process that increases both customer satisfaction and spending at the same time.

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