The Influence of Digital Social Media and Customers' Usage Frequency of Digital Media Products on the Marketing of these Products via Platforms; first funding period: The Influence of Social Networks on the Sequential Marketing of Short-Lifecycle Hedonic

在第一个资助期，我们估计了营销活动对数字社交媒体（DSM）中享乐媒体产品（HMP）销售的效应大小。考虑到HMP在不同分销渠道上的顺序营销，我们开发了一个优化模型，可以分析不同营销活动的有效性。更详细地说，我们研究了顺序分销的时机、渠道间的价格差异、口碑及其延续和溢出效应。对控制图书价格弹性内生性的各种方法的比较表明，在OLS的帮助下，对一套相当完整的销售质量指标进行回归就足够了。所得的价格弹性在不同的方法和数据集中都很小。对于广告和口碑弹性，根据之前的荟萃分析，我们发现大约0.1的合理值，从长远来看，我们提供了一个全面的荟萃分析，可以从延续效应中额外受益。为了获得HMP跨连续渠道的最佳营销组合，我们开发了一个以模块化方式设计的模型，并为单一营销活动提供封闭形式的解决方案。基于对meta分析和行业报告的现实值的校准，我们发现图书市场的价格差异是最关键的，而与文献相反的跨渠道时机导致了角落解决方案。然而，数字HMP越来越多地通过Netflix（电影）、Spotify（音乐）和Skoobe（书籍）等平台进行营销，这些平台提供大量的流媒体服务，作为固定费用订阅。这些平台上的用户使用行为记录（数据化）使这些平台能够根据音乐厂牌和艺术家的歌曲播放量相应地对他们进行补偿。这导致了与第一个融资期类似的顺序分配策略问题。特别是，我们需要分析唱片公司或歌手是应该暂时只出售实体cd或下载歌曲，还是应该同时、推迟或永远在Spotify上提供歌曲。然而，与当前的融资期相反，问题延伸到通过这些平台进行的发行是否有利可图。为了调查这些研究问题，我们需要从调查、市场数据或实验中得出消费者偏好函数的信息。此外，使用补偿将导致艺术家之间的激烈竞争。因此，通过数字社交媒体（DSM）进行自我营销变得更有吸引力。因此，我们想要分析替代活动的有效性以及它们对优化的重要性。这些新的研究问题建立在第一个资助期的结果之上，但现在侧重于HMP的使用方面。

In the first funding period, we estimated the effect size of marketing activities on the sales of hedonic media products (HMP) in digital social media (DSM). Given the sequential marketing of HMP across different distribution channels we developed an optimization model which allows for analyzing the effectiveness of the different marketing activities. In more detail, we investigated the timing of the sequential distribution, the price differentiation across channels, the word-of-mouth and its carryover and spillover effects. A comparison of various methods of controlling for endogeneity for the price elasticity of books revealed that it is sufficient to regress a rather complete set of quality indicators on sales with the help of OLS. The resulting price elasticity was small across different methods and data sets. For the advertising and WOM elasticities we find plausible values of about 0.1 in accordance with previous meta-analyses where one can additionally benefit in the long-run from carryover effects for which we provided a comprehensive meta-analysis. To derive the optimal marketing-mix for the HMP across the sequential channels, we developed a model which is designed in a modular way and offers closed-form solutions for single marketing activities. Based on a calibration with realistic values from meta-analyses and industry reports we find for the book market that the price differentiation is the most critical while the timing across channels contrary to the literature leads to corner solutions.However, digital HMP are increasingly marketed via platforms such as Netflix (movies), Spotify (music), and Skoobe (books) that offer large assortments for streaming as flat fee subscriptions. Records of customer usage behavior on these platforms (datafication) allows these platforms to compensate music labels and artists in turn proportional to the streaming of their songs. This leads to similar sequential distribution strategy questions as in the first funding period. In particular, we need to analyze whether music labels or artists should rather start to sell their physical CDs or downloads of songs exclusively for a while or whether they should offer their songs on Spotify either at the same time, delayed or never. However, in contrast to the current funding period the question extends to whether the offering via these platforms is profitable at all.To investigate these research questions we need information on the preference functions of consumers elicited either from surveys, market data, or experiments. In addition, the usage compensation will entail fiercer competition among artists. Self-marketing via digital social media (DSM) becomes thus more attractive. Consequently, we want to analyze the effectiveness of the alternative activities and the importance of them for optimization. These new research questions build on the results of the first funding period but focus now on the usage aspect of HMP.