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New research on advertising from Harvard Business School faculty on issues including strategy and tactics, digital advertising, measuring impact and advertising technology.
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The Legacy of Boaty McBoatface: Beware of Customers Who Vote

by Michael Blanding

Companies that encourage consumers to vote online should be forewarned—they may expect more than you promise, according to research by Michael Norton, Leslie John, and colleagues. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

Large-Scale Demand Estimation with Search Data

by Tomomichi Amano, Andrew Rhodes, and Stephan Seiler

Online retailers face the challenge of leveraging the rich data they collect on their websites to uncover insights about consumer behavior. This study proposes a practical and tractable model of economic behavior that can reveal helpful patterns of cross-product substitution. The model can be used to simulate optimal prices.

Warning: Scary Warning Labels Work!

by Dina Gerdeman

If you want to convince consumers to stay away from unhealthy diet choices, don't be subtle about possible consequences, says Leslie John. These graphically graphic warning labels seem to do the trick. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

'Likes' Lead to Nothing—and Other Hard-Learned Lessons of Social Media Marketing

by Dina Gerdeman

A decade-and-a-half after the dawn of social media marketing, brands are still learning what works and what doesn't with consumers. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

The Revolution in Advertising: From Don Draper to Big Data

Re: John A. Deighton

The Mad Men of advertising are being replaced by data scientists and analysts. In this podcast, marketing professor John Deighton and advertising legend Sir Martin Sorrell discuss the positives and negatives of digital marketing. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

Hiding Products From Customers May Ultimately Boost Sales

by Carmen Nobel

Is it smart for retailers to display their wares to customers a few at a time or all at once? The answer depends largely on the product category, according to research by Kris Johnson Ferreira and Joel Goh. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

Why Comparing Apples to Apples Online Leads To More Fruitful Sales

by Dina Gerdeman

The items displayed next to a product in online marketing displays may determine whether customers buy that product, according to a new study by Uma R. Karmarkar. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

Paid Search Ads Pay Off for Lesser-Known Restaurants

by Dina Gerdeman

Researchers Michael Luca and Weijia Dai wanted to know if paid search ads pay off for small businesses such as restaurants. The answer: Yes, but not for long. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

How Wayfair Built a Furniture Brand from Scratch

What was once a collection of 240 home furnishing sites is now a single, successful brand, Wayfair.com. How that brand developed over time and the challenges and opportunities presented by search engine marketing are discussed by Thales Teixeira. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

What Does Boaty McBoatface Tell Us About Brand Control on the Internet?

by James Heskett

SUMMING UP. Boaty McBoatface may have been shot down as the social-media sourced name of a research vessel, but James Heskett's readers are up to their hip-boots in opinions on the matter. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

Why People Don’t Vote--and How a Good Ground Game Helps

by Michael Blanding

Recent research by Vincent Pons shows that campaigners knocking on the doors of potential voters not only improves overall turnout but helps individual candidates win more of those votes. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

Can Customer Reviews Be 'Managed?'

by Brian Kenny

Consumers increasingly rely on peer reviews on TripAdvisor and other sites to make purchase decisions, so it makes sense that companies have a stake in wanting to shape those opinions. But can they? Thales Teixeira says a good product trumps all. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

A Dedication to Creation: India's Ad Man Ranjan Kapur

by Sean Silverthorne

How do you build a brand amid the uncertainties and opportunities of a developing market? Harvard Business School Professor Sunil Gupta shares lessons learned from Ranjan Kapur, an iconic figure in the Indian advertising industry. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

Build It, Buy It Or Both? Rethinking the Sourcing of Advertising Services

by Alvin J. Silk

The scale and scope of in-house advertising services is increasing. These developments are part and parcel of the restructuring of the advertising and marketing services industry more broadly. In this paper the authors provide guidance to senior managers considering bringing their internal and external agency resources together to arrive at a more collaborative operating model. Two case examples of successful internal/external agency collaboration are included. Closed for comment; 0 Comment(s) posted.

Sharpening Your Skills: Social Media

Re: Multiple Faculty

Sharpening Your Skills culls the HBS Working Knowledge archive to deliver insights around important business topics. This week: developing a social media strategy. Open for comment; 0 Comment(s) posted.

Digital Initiative Summit: Big Messages, Small Screens, Many Choices

by Carmen Nobel

How do companies profit from the fact that mobile users are more engaged than ever? Panelists discuss "Monetization in a Mobile World." Open for comment; 0 Comment(s) posted.

Digital Initiative Summit: Companies Must Forget—and Borrow

by Dina Gerdeman

Entering the digital economy, commercial giants must adapt to new ways of doing business, but not forget how they achieved success in the first place. Open for comment; 1 Comment(s) posted.

World Cup Soccer: 770 Billion Minutes of Attention

by Thales Teixeira

FIFA stands to generate $23 billion in revenue from World Cup soccer over the next few weeks. Clearly the organization understands "Attention Economics," says marketing expert Thales Teixeira. Open for comment; 2 Comment(s) posted.

Encouraging Niche Content in an Ad-Driven World

by Julia Hanna

Research by Feng Zhu and Monic Sun explores how advertising drives bloggers to shift their writing to subjects that will grab more eyeballs—namely, the stock market, celebrities, and salacious behavior. But surprise: Ads might also help generate more niche content. Closed for comment; 0 Comment(s) posted.

A Brand Manager’s Guide to Losing Control

by Carmen Nobel

Social media platforms have taken some of the marketing power away from companies and given it to consumers. Jill Avery discusses the landscape of "open source branding," wherein consumers not only discuss and disseminate branded content, they also create it. Closed for comment; 9 Comment(s) posted.