Sunil Gupta
There are 5 articles for this faculty member.
About Faculty in this Article:
Sunil Gupta is the Edward W. Carter Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School.
Social Network Marketing: What Works?
| Q&A with: | Sunil Gupta |
|---|---|
| Published: | July 27, 2009 |
| Feature: | Research & Ideas |
Purchase decisions are influenced differently in social networks than in the brick-and-mortar world, says Harvard Business School professor Sunil Gupta. The key: Marketers should tap into the networking aspect of sites such as Facebook.
Do Friends Influence Purchases in a Social Network?
| Authors: | Raghuram Iyengar, Sangman Han, and Sunil Gupta |
|---|---|
| Published: | May 21, 2009 |
| Paper Release Date: | April 2009 |
| Feature: | Working Papers |
In spite of the cultural and social revolution in the rise of social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace (and in South Korea, Cyworld), the business viability of these sites remains in question. While many sites are attempting to follow Google and generate revenues from advertising, will advertising be effective? If friends influence the purchases of a user in a social network, it could potentially be a significant source of revenue for the sites and their corporate sponsors. Using a unique data set from Cyworld, this study empirically assesses if friends indeed influence purchases. The answer: It depends. Findings are relevant for social networking sites and large advertisers.
Published in 2008
Solving the Marketing Resources Allocation Puzzle
| Q&A with: | Sunil Gupta and Thomas J. Steenburgh |
|---|---|
| Published: | July 21, 2008 |
| Feature: | Research & Ideas |
Television spots, word-of-mouth, viral ads. Marketing managers have more options at their disposal than ever before. But how to decide? Harvard Business School professors Sunil Gupta and Thomas Steenburgh offer a way for managers to conceptualize the most effective approach.
Allocating Marketing Resources
| Authors: | Sunil Gupta and Thomas J. Steenburgh |
|---|---|
| Published: | March 12, 2008 |
| Paper Release Date: | February 2008 |
| Feature: | Working Papers |
Deciding how to allocate marketing resources is particularly difficult because decisions need to be made at many different levels—across countries, products, marketing mix elements, and different vehicles within elements of the mix (e.g., television versus the Internet for advertising). With the increasing availability of data and sophistication in methods, it is now possible to more judiciously allocate marketing resources. In this paper, HBS professors Gupta and Steenburgh discuss a two-stage process where a model of demand is estimated in stage-one and its estimates are used as inputs in an optimization model in stage-two. The researchers propose a matrix with three approaches for each of these two stages, and discuss the pros and cons of these methods. They highlight each method with applications and case studies to present rigorous yet practical approaches to making marketing resource allocation decisions.
Published in 2007
How Do You Value a "Free" Customer?
| Q&A with: | Sunil Gupta |
|---|---|
| Published: | March 7, 2007 |
| Feature: | Research & Ideas |
Sometimes a valuable customer may be the person who never buys a thing. In a new research paper, Professor Sunil Gupta discusses how to assess the profitability of a customer in a networked setting—a "free" customer who nevertheless influences your bottom line.
