Viral Marketing: Identifying Likely Adopters Via Consumer Networks

We investigate the hypothesis: those consumers who have communicated with a customer of a particular service have increased likelihood of adopting the service. We survey the diverse literature on such "viral marketing," providing a categorization of the specific research questions asked, the data analyzed, and the statistical methods used. We highlight a striking gap in the literature: no prior study has had both of the two key types of data necessary to provide direct support for the hypothesis: data on communications between consumers, and data on product adoption. We suggest a type of service for which both types of data are available telecommunications services. Then, for a particular telecommunication service, we show support for the hypothesis. Specifically, we show three main results. 1) there is such a "viral" effect and it is statistically significant, resulting in take rates 3-5 times greater than a baseline group; 2) attributes constructed from the consumer network can improve models for ranking of targeted customers by likelihood of adoption, and 3) observing the network allows the firm to target new customers that would have fallen through the cracks, because they would not have been identified based solely on the traditional set of attributes used for marketing by the firm. We close with a discussion of challenges and opportunities for research in this area. For example, can one determine whether the reason for the viral effect is customer advocacy (e.g., via "word of mouth") versus network-identified homophily?Information Systems Working Papers Serie

Florida Bay Science Program: a synthesis of research on Florida Bay

This report documents the progress made toward the objectives established in the Strategic Plan revised in 1997 for the agencies cooperating in the program. These objectives are expressed as five questions that organized the research on the Florida Bay ecosystem: Ecosystem History What was the Florida Bay ecosystem like 50, 100, and 150 years ago? Question 1—Physical Processes How and at what rates do storms, changing freshwater flows, sea level rise, and local evaporation and precipitation influence circulation and salinity patterns within Florida Bay and exchange between the bay and adjacent waters? Question 2—Nutrient Dynamics What is the relative importance of the influx of external nutrients and of internal nutrient cycling in determining the nutrient budget for Florida Bay? What mechanisms control the sources and sinks of the bay’s nutrients? Question 3—Plankton Blooms What regulates the onset, persistence, and fate of planktonic algal blooms in Florida Bay? Question 4—Seagrass Ecology What are the causes and mechanisms for the observed changes in the seagrass community of Florida Bay? What is the effect of changing salinity, light, and nutrient regimes on these communities? Question 5—Higher Trophic Levels What is the relationship between environmental and habitat change and the recruitment, growth, and survivorship of animals in Florida Bay? Each question examines different characteristics of the Florida Bay ecosystem and the relation of these to the geomorphological setting of the bay and to processes linking the bay with adjacent systems and driving change.This report also examines the additional question of what changes have occurred in Florida Bay over the past 150 years

Viral Marketing: Identifying Likely Adopters Via Consumer Networks

We investigate the hypothesis: those consumers who have communicated with a customer of a particular service have increased likelihood of adopting the service. We survey the diverse literature on such "viral marketing," providing a categorization of the specific research questions asked, the data analyzed, and the statistical methods used. We highlight a striking gap in the literature: no prior study has had both of the two key types of data necessary to provide direct support for the hypothesis: data on communications between consumers, and data on product adoption. We suggest a type of service for which both types of data are available telecommunications services. Then, for a particular telecommunication service, we show support for the hypothesis. Specifically, we show three main results. 1) there is such a "viral" effect and it is statistically significant, resulting in take rates 3-5 times greater than a baseline group; 2) attributes constructed from the consumer network can improve models for ranking of targeted customers by likelihood of adoption, and 3) observing the network allows the firm to target new customers that would have fallen through the cracks, because they would not have been identified based solely on the traditional set of attributes used for marketing by the firm. We close with a discussion of challenges and opportunities for research in this area. For example, can one determine whether the reason for the viral effect is customer advocacy (e.g., via "word of mouth") versus network-identified homophily?Information Systems Working Papers Serie

A Review of Consumer-Facing Digital Technologies Across Different Types of Fashion Store Formats

Several current trends in the fashion retail and marketing landscape are associated with the ongoing digital revolution, including the increasing tendency for fashion retailers to adopt consumer-facing digital technologies across their online and physical store formats. Such technology helps improve the store environment by conferring a more engaging and stimulating shopping experience for consumers. This chapter provides a review of existing literature, supported by relevant industry reports and current examples from key players in the fashion retail sector, to provide a comprehensive analysis of different types of consumer-facing digital technology in various fashion store formats and how they impact on the overall shopping experience. The authors review a number of technologies including interactive touchscreens, RFID tags, beacon technology, magic mirrors and mobile apps, and consider how they are implemented in online stores, digitally enhanced stores, brand stores and pop-up stores in the fashion sector

A numerical modeling study on barotropic and baroclinic responses of the Chesapeake Bay to hurricane events

The barotropic and baroclinic responses of the Chesapeake Bay to forcings from two hurricanes were investigated by using unstructured-grid three-dimensional hydrodynamic models. The model domain includes Chesapeake Bay proper, the tributaries, and its extended continental shelf in the mid-Atlantic Bight. Two hurricanes were studied: Hurricane Floyd of September, 1999 and Hurricane Isabel of September, 2003, both of which made landfall within 100 km of the Chesapeake Bay mouth. Hurricane Floyd in 1999 passed through the entrance of the Bay from southwest to northeast along the coastlines of Virginia as a Category 1 storm, whereas Hurricane Isabel in 2003 made landfall on the east coast of North Carolina and moved inland toward the northwest as a Category 2 storm. For the barotropic simulation of the Bay responding to the hurricanes, the model results were compared with Bay-wide water level observations and the model showed reasonable prediction skill. It was found that the storm surge has two phases: a primary surge induced by the remote winds and a secondary surge induced by the local winds. For both hurricanes, the primary surge induced by remote winds propagated into the Bay initially, but the subsequent phase, influenced by the local wind, was notably different. Hurricane Floyd was followed by northerly (down-Bay) winds, that reduced the primary surge effect and caused a localized set-down; Hurricane Isabel was followed by southerly (up-Bay) winds, which superimposed on the primary surge effect and caused a localized set-up. The volume and salt fluxes were estimated at selected cross-sectional transects throughout the Bay, and it was found consistently for each transect that the net influx dominated during Hurricane Isabel while the net outflux dominated during Hurricane Floyd. For the Bay\u27s tributaries, the large inland river discharge at the headwater can couple with the storm surge event to increase sea surface elevation on the second phase of sea surface elevation rise, which has a significant impact on inundation in the local low-lying areas. For the baroclinic response of the Bay to the hurricanes, the model results agreed reasonably well with additional observed data: sea surface elevation, velocity, and salinity profiles. From the perspective of salt flux, oceanic saltwater influx was evidently pushed into the Bay from the continental shelf at the initial phase of Hurricanes Floyd and Isabel associated with storm surge and salt intrusion. In the second phase, follow up with, down-bay local winds of eastern-type storms tend to enhance the stratification whereas up-Bay local winds of western-type storms tend to reduce the stratification. The hurricane surface wind stress is the primary agent for destratifying water column by transferring generated turbulent kinetic energy to the lower layer. The wind-induced straining during Hurricane Floyd was verified using non-dimensional parameters that incorporated the wind direction and the horizontal salinity gradient. Direct precipitation of hurricane rainfall acted more like a point source onto the Bay surface water, which created a layer of low surface salinity on the sea surface. It has an implication dynamically on generating a sea surface horizontal pressure gradient and re-distributing salinity field after the storm. Extra efforts have been made to conduct idealized experiments for comparing long-term recovery of the Bay to the disturbance created by the two hurricanes. Realistic hurricane wind forcing was applied in a 4-day window with the same initial condition applied in the beginning, and the quasi-steady state condition achieved in the end. Through this exercise, it was found that it took Bay 5-7 days to return to normal condition from the sea surface elevation disturbances for both Hurricanes Floyd and Isabel. For the salinity fields, it took within a range of 20-30 days to recover to the pre-storm condition for the middle and southern portions of the Bay. For the northern portion of the Bay, however, due to the landward barotropic pressure gradient generated a strong salinity rebound and the associated oscillation subsequently after Hurricane Floyd passed, it required twice as long to recover. Sensitivity testing of the effect of river discharge (immediately after the storm) on the recovery time has also been performed. Lastly, the influences of continental shelf dynamics on the Bay\u27s response to the hurricane were examined. It was found that the along shelf wind contributed to the inflow and ouflow at the Bay mouth in the form of Ekman transport, which complemented the contribution generated by the Bay\u27s local wind. The onshore and offshore shelf wind also played a significant role. Because the cyclonic pattern of the hurricane wind field, when the hurricane made the landfall in the US East coast, an along-the-shelf pressure gradient from the north to the south was generated. This pressure gradient, coupled with the Coriolis and friction forces, can generate a quasi-geostrophic balance flow serving to prevent or enhance the inflow across the Bay mouth. The effect is particularly noticeable in the relaxation period during the hurricane passage

Scaling Up with Radically Embodied Cognition

Radically embodied cognitive science (REC) is typically concerned with basic cognition such as perception and action. However, complex cognition or higher-order cognition is difficult to explain for REC, as these theories eschew traditional representational explanations. This leaves REC with a scaling-up problem. In this dissertation I will explore options for REC to fix its scaling-up problem. I am specifically interested in autonoetic cognition, which is the ability to remember and imagine objects and events in the way they would be experienced if they were immediately present to be perceived. I contend that a simulationist account provides many of th necessary conceptual tools for understanding autonoetic cognition from a REC perspective. Furthermore, simulationist accounts are generally useful, as they are suggestive of a way to understand the observed neural activity and can be used to make empirical predictions. I will examine different simulationist theories in order to determine whether or not they can cohere with REC and help solve the scaling-up problem. Eventually I will argue that the REC commitment to reject representations makes the scaling-up problem insurmountable at this time

Co-creating Videogames

This book is available as open access through the Bloomsbury Open Access programme and is available on www.bloomsburycollections.com. Co-creativity has become a significant cultural and economic phenomenon. Media consumers have become media producers. This book offers a rich description and analysis of the emerging participatory, co-creative relationships within the videogames industry. Banks discusses the challenges of incorporating these co-creative relationships into the development process. Drawing on a decade of research within the industry, the book gives us valuable insight into the continually changing and growing world of video games