Business Policy Experiments using Fractional Factorial Designs: Consumer Retention on DoorDash

This paper investigates an approach to both speed up business decision-making and lower the cost of learning through experimentation by factorizing business policies and employing fractional factorial experimental designs for their evaluation. We illustrate how this method integrates with advances in the estimation of heterogeneous treatment effects, elaborating on its advantages and foundational assumptions. We empirically demonstrate the implementation and benefits of our approach and assess its validity in evaluating consumer promotion policies at DoorDash, which is one of the largest delivery platforms in the US. Our approach discovers a policy with 5% incremental profit at 67% lower implementation cost.Comment: 14 page

Parallel Experimentation in a Competitive Advertising Marketplace

When multiple firms are simultaneously running experiments on a platform, the treatment effects for one firm may depend on the experimentation policies of others. This paper presents a set of causal estimands that are relevant to such an environment. We also present an experimental design that is suitable for facilitating experimentation across multiple competitors in such an environment. Together, these can be used by a platform to run experiments "as a service," on behalf of its participating firms. We show that the causal estimands we develop are identified nonparametrically by the variation induced by the design, and present two scalable estimators that help measure them in typical high-dimensional situations. We implement the design on the advertising platform of JD.com, an eCommerce company, which is also a publisher of digital ads in China. We discuss how the design is engineered within the platform's auction-driven ad-allocation system, which is typical of modern, digital advertising marketplaces. Finally, we present results from a parallel experiment involving 16 advertisers and millions of JD.com users. These results showcase the importance of accommodating a role for interactions across experimenters and demonstrates the viability of the framework

Reducing the environmental impact of surgery on a global scale: systematic review and co-prioritization with healthcare workers in 132 countries

Abstract Background Healthcare cannot achieve net-zero carbon without addressing operating theatres. The aim of this study was to prioritize feasible interventions to reduce the environmental impact of operating theatres. Methods This study adopted a four-phase Delphi consensus co-prioritization methodology. In phase 1, a systematic review of published interventions and global consultation of perioperative healthcare professionals were used to longlist interventions. In phase 2, iterative thematic analysis consolidated comparable interventions into a shortlist. In phase 3, the shortlist was co-prioritized based on patient and clinician views on acceptability, feasibility, and safety. In phase 4, ranked lists of interventions were presented by their relevance to high-income countries and low–middle-income countries. Results In phase 1, 43 interventions were identified, which had low uptake in practice according to 3042 professionals globally. In phase 2, a shortlist of 15 intervention domains was generated. In phase 3, interventions were deemed acceptable for more than 90 per cent of patients except for reducing general anaesthesia (84 per cent) and re-sterilization of ‘single-use’ consumables (86 per cent). In phase 4, the top three shortlisted interventions for high-income countries were: introducing recycling; reducing use of anaesthetic gases; and appropriate clinical waste processing. In phase 4, the top three shortlisted interventions for low–middle-income countries were: introducing reusable surgical devices; reducing use of consumables; and reducing the use of general anaesthesia. Conclusion This is a step toward environmentally sustainable operating environments with actionable interventions applicable to both high– and low–middle–income countries

Journal of Marketing Research : Vol. LIII, No. 4, August 2016

1. Advertising Spillovers : Evidence from Online Field Experiments and Implications for Returns on Advertising 2. When Sex and Romance Conflict : The Effect of Sexual Imagery in Advertising on Preference for Romantically Linked Products and Services 3. Competitive Advantage Through Engagement 4. Marketing\u27s Impact on Firm Value : Generalizations from a Meta-Analysis 5. Expense Neglect in Forecasting Personal Finance Etc