Optimal duration of magazine promotions

The planning of promotions and other marketing events frequently requires manufacturers to make decisions about the optimal duration of these activities. Yet manufacturers often lack the support tools for decision making. We assume that customer decisions at the aggregated level follow a state-dependent Markov process. On the basis of the expected economic return associated with dynamic response to stimuli, we determine the ideal length of marketing events using dynamic programming optimization and apply the model to a complex promotion event. Results suggest that this methodology could help managers in the publishing industry to plan the optimal duration of promotion event

Do business density and variety determine retail performance?

Outlet location plays a crucial role in retail strategy. In this paper we study the relationship between spatial density (concentration) of retailers in the trade area and their economic performance. This analysis will help managers figure out the economic potential of starting a retail business in a given area, reducing business start-up risks. We find that retail businesses located in high and low retail density zones enjoy higher performance levels, consistent with competitive advantage arising from agglomeration economies and local market power respectively. We also find that retail businesses located in intermediate density areas use a differentiation strategy based on business variety (diversification across stores). Outlets located in areas with the highest variety enjoy performance levels similar to those achieved in the agglomeration and low density areas. The results suggest that retail companies should jointly consider variety and density to determine location

Magazine sales promotion : a dynamic response analysis

This paper studies the impact and effectiveness of a type of non-price promotion often used in the European periodical magazines industry to stimulate sales, in which a value pack is sold containing the magazine issue plus another product. Magazines are sold simultaneously with and without promotion at different prices, and promotions are serialized by fractioning the additional product across different issues of the magazine. We find that promoted magazines contemporarily cannibalize non-promoted sales; but this loss is compensated by a medium term increase of non-promoted sales. These results show that this sales promotion strategy is an effective way to diminish the decline rate of periodical sales

Optimal duration of magazine promotions.

The planning of promotions and other marketing events frequently requires manufacturers to make decisions about the optimal duration of these activities. Yet manufacturers often lack the support tools for decision making. We assume that customer decisions at the aggregated level follow a state-dependent Markov process. On the basis of the expected economic return associated with dynamic response to stimuli, we determine the ideal length of marketing events using dynamic programming optimization and apply the model to a complex promotion event. Results suggest that this methodology could help managers in the publishing industry to plan the optimal duration of promotion events.Optimal duration of promotion events; Markovian process; Dynamic programming;

Magazine sales promotion : a dynamic response analysis

This paper studies the effectiveness of a type of nonprice promotion often used in the European magazines industry to diminish the decline rate of periodical sales, in which a value pack is sold containing the magazine issue plus another product. Magazines are sold simultaneously with and without promotion at different prices, and promotions are serialized by fractioning the additional product across different issues of the magazine. Although promoting magazines contemporarily may cannibalize nonpromoted sales, this loss is compensated by a long-term increase in nonpromoted sales caused by product awareness and loyalty improvements. This strategy is increasingly used as an innovative form of product advertising.Publicad

Magazine sales promotion : a dynamic response analysis.

This paper studies the effectiveness of a type of nonprice promotion often used in the European magazines industry to diminish the decline rate of periodical sales, in which a value pack is sold containing the magazine issue plus another product. Magazines are sold simultaneously with and without promotion at different prices, and promotions are serialized by fractioning the additional product across different issues of the magazine. Although promoting magazines contemporarily may cannibalize nonpromoted sales, this loss is compensated by a long-term increase in nonpromoted sales caused by product awareness and loyalty improvements. This strategy is increasingly used as an innovative form of product advertising.

Globally multimodal problem optimization via an estimation of distribution algorithm based on unsupervised learning of Bayesian networks

Many optimization problems are what can be called globally multimodal, i.e., they present several global optima. Unfortunately, this is a major source of difficulties for most estimation of distribution algorithms, making their effectiveness and efficiency degrade, due to genetic drift. With the aim of overcoming these drawbacks for discrete globally multimodal problem optimization, this paper introduces and evaluates a new estimation of distribution algorithm based on unsupervised learning of Bayesian networks. We report the satisfactory results of our experiments with symmetrical binary optimization problems

Optimal Duration of Magazine Promotions

The planning of promotions and other marketing events frequently requires manufacturers to make decisions about the optimal duration of these activities. Yet manufacturers often lack the support tools for decision making. We assume that customer decisions at the aggregated level follow a state-dependent Markov process. On the basis of the expected economic return associated with dynamic response to stimuli, we determine the ideal length of marketing events using dynamic programming optimization and apply the model to a complex promotion event. Results suggest that this methodology could help managers in the publishing industry to plan the optimal duration of promotion events. Copyright Springer Science + Business Media, Inc. 2005optimal duration of promotion events, Markovian process, dynamic programming,