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New research on customers from Harvard Business School faculty on issues including customer focus, customer relationship management, and measuring customer satisfaction.
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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.

Customers at the Back of the Line Are Anxious—Can You Keep Them from Leaving?

by Michael Blanding

The irrational anxiety associated with being last in line can lead to unhappy customers, according to new research by Ryan Buell. But there are ways to make people happier while they wait—and keep them from abandoning the queue. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

Last Place Aversion in Queues

by Ryan W. Buell

While no one likes standing in line for service, being last intensifies the pain of waiting, doubles the probability of switching queues, and quadruples the chances of leaving the line altogether. Many service settings could be improved if managers actively mitigated last place aversion.

How to Design a Better Customer Experience

by Dina Gerdeman

With the help of LEGO bricks, Stefan Thomke helps business executives discover how design principles can serve as building blocks to create a great customer experience. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

Does Le Pliage Help or Hurt the Longchamp Luxury Brand?

Re: Jill J. Avery

Longchamp's iconic but affordable Le Pliage bag is a conundrum for the company, explains Jill Avery in this podcast. Does an affordable luxury product work against the top-tier brand? Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

Op-Ed: It’s a Bad Idea to Ban Customers From Recording Videos

by Benjamin G. Edelman

With videos of bad business practices routinely going viral, it might be tempting to prohibit customers from recording their surroundings. But banning cameras is the wrong way to go, says Benjamin Edelman. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

Why Uber Is Worth Saving and How To Do It

by Dina Gerdeman

For many, Uber is a cautionary tale of corporate hubris gone crazy. But Rosabeth Moss Kanter argues the innovator deserves a second chance. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

This Turkish Debt Collector Is Customer-friendly

by Michael Blanding

A Turkish-based company pioneers a kinder, gentler method of collecting debt that Professor Dennis Campbell sees as an international model. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

Cost-cutting Leads to Turbulence in the Airline Industry

Re: Susanna Gallani

When a business known for delivering an exemplary customer experience faces cutbacks, what services get chopped? Assistant Professor Susanna Gallani discusses a recent case study about an airline that looks not just to survive a downturn but emerge stronger. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

How Uber, Airbnb, and Etsy Attracted Their First 1,000 Customers

by Michael Blanding

Thales Teixeira studies three of the most successful “platform” startups to understand the chicken-and-egg challenge of how companies can attract their first customers. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

The State of Customer Service Leadership

by Jim Aisner

The economic future of the country is largely in the hands of those who lead our service organizations, which create more employment and GDP growth than any other sector. Jim Heskett, Earl Sasser, and Len Schlesinger discuss the current state of service and their recent book, What Great Service Leaders Know & Do. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

Self-Interest: The Economist's Straitjacket

by Robert Simons

Research explores the downsides of self-interest on businesses, government, and the economy as a whole.

Internalizing Global Value Chains: A Firm-Level Analysis

by Laura Alfaro, Pol Antras, Davin Chor & Paola Conconi

Manufacturing activities that used to be performed in close proximity are increasingly fragmented across firms and countries. This paper provides strong evidence that considerations driven by contractual frictions critically shape firms' ownership decisions along their value chains.

Where Did My Shopping Mall Go?

by Sean Silverthorne

The growing popularity of online shopping is remaking the world of offline shopping—stores are getting smaller, malls are getting scarcer. Rajiv Lal and José Alvarez look ahead five years at our radically transforming shopping experience. Plus: Book excerpt. Open for comment; 13 Comment(s) posted.

Disruptors Sell What Customers Want and Let Competitors Sell What They Don’t

by Michael Blanding

By "decoupling" activities that consumers value from the ones they don't, enterprising digital startups are wreaking havoc on established firms. Thales Teixeira discusses his research on the second wave of Internet disruption. Open for comment; 8 Comment(s) posted.

Mobile Money: The Effect of Service Quality and Competition on Demand

by Karthik Balasubramanian & David F. Drake

Mobile money—the use of electronic money transfer through cellular networks—is rapidly expanding in developing countries, especially among the "unbanked." One persistent problem for mobile money agents, however, has been managing inventory and service quality. Using data from Kenya and Uganda, two East African countries at different stages of mobile money market development, the authors introduce an operations management lens for mobile money and explore the effects of competition and service quality on demand. Closed for comment; 0 Comment(s) posted.

Secrets to a Successful Social Media Strategy

by Carmen Nobel

Misiek Piskorski explores the secrets of successful social media tactics in his new book, A Social Strategy: How We Profit From Social Media. Open for comment; 6 Comment(s) posted.

Excerpt: ‘A Social Strategy’

An excerpt from A Social Strategy: How We Profit From Social Media by Mikolaj Jan Piskorski Open for comment; 1 Comment(s) posted.

Why Companies Should Compete for Your Privacy

by Dina Gerdeman

Consumers are sometimes willing to trade personal data for lower prices. How should companies compete for that valuable information? A discussion with Ramon Casadesus-Masanell and Andrés Hervás-Drane. Open for comment; 2 Comment(s) posted.