Predicting & Optimizing Consumer Response to Product Search Results
Expedia www.expedia.com, the largest online travel company in the world and an AAW Corporate Partner, seeks new approaches to determining which hotels to display when a consumer searches for a hotel on Expedia.com. By tailoring search results according to characteristics of the user session, the search query and the user profile, Expedia hopes to dramatically improve the proportion of customers who ultimately book a hotel through Expedia websites. To model consumer response, Expedia provided a dataset that details events leading up to conversion (or failure to convert) for approximately 10,000 US-based users searching for hotels in each of four geographic markets (Cancun, NYC, Paris and Budapest). The data includes information about how the user arrived at Expedia, what promotional pages they have viewed, details of their search query such as dates and number of travelers, which hotels were displayed in search results, which hotels were clicked on and which hotels were purchased. Some of the research teams are also investigating issues related to consumer behavior and user-interface design, such as how consumers will react to search results that might change from one session to another or what is the right number of hotel listings to provide each user.
Note: This Research Opportunity remains open for proposal submissions. Interested researchers can submit proposals online through the Archived Proposal Submission Portal. Researchers are encouraged to review proposal submission guidelines before submitting their proposal. Additional questions can be directed to analytics@wharton.upenn.edu.
Research Teams
GRANTEES OF THE EXPEDIA DATA:
SEARCH WITH REFINEMENT (READ THE RESULTING PAPER HERE)
Yuxin Chen, Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University
Song Yao, Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University
CONVERSIONS AND CHOICE OF DOMINATED ALTERNATIVES
Vidyanand (VC) Choudhary ,University of California-Irvine
Imran S. Currim, University of California-Irvine
Sanjeev Dewan, University of California-Irvine
Ofer Mintz, University of California-Irvine
John Turner, University of California – Irvine
TO BE TRUSTED IS A GREATER COMPLIMENT THAN BEING LOVED”: THE ROLE OF TRUST AND PREFERENCE DEVELOPMENT IN REACTIONS TO PRODUCT LISTINGS
Kristin Diehl, University of Southern California
Sean Coary, University of Southern California
EXPEDIA: PREDICTING & OPTIMIZING CONSUMER RESPONSE TO PRODUCT SEARCH RESULTS
Fred Feinberg, Ross School of Business, University of Michigan
Kee Yeun Lee, Ross School of Business, University of Michigan
Paul Michaud, Ross School of Business, University of Michigan
STRATEGIC CUSTOMER BEHAVIOR AND ITS IMPACT ON REVENUE MANAGEMENT STRATEGIES: EVIDENCE FROM EXPEDIA
Jun Li, The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania
Serguei Netessine, The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania
EXPEDIA: PREDICTING & OPTIMIZING CONSUMER RESPONSE TO PRODUCT SEARCH RESULTS
B.P.S. Murthi, School of Management, The University of Texas at Dallas
Sumit Sarkar, School of Management, The University of Texas at Dallas
Pelin Atahan, Ozyegin University (Turkey)
Monica Johar, University of North Carolina, Charlotte
EXAMINING THE ROLE OF ASSORTMENT STRUCTURE IN ONLINE SEARCH RESULTS USING A LATENT DISTANCE MODEL
Young-Hoon Park, Johnson Graduate School of Management, Cornell University
David A. Schweidel, Wisconsin School of Business, University of Wisconsin, Madison
PREDICTING & OPTIMIZING CONSUMER RESPONSE TO PRODUCT SEARCH RESULTS
Shengrui Wang, Shu Wu, Simon Renaud-Deputter,
Teng Ke Xiong, University of Sherbrooke
Belkacem Chikhaoui, University of Sherbrooke
Mohamed Bouguessa, University of Quebec in Outaouais
LISTING STRATEGIES OF AN ONLINE MARKETPLACE UNDER CONSUMER SEARCH AND CONVERSION: A GAME THEORY APPROACH
Jie Zhang, The University of Texas at Arlington
Xueming Luo, The University of Texas at Arlington
DECIPHERING CONSUMER NAVIGATION PATTERNS AND THEIR IMPACT ON CONVERSION FROM HOTEL SEARCH CLICKSTREAM DATA
Ernan Haruvy, University of Texas at Dallas
B.P.S. Murthi, University of Texas at Dallas
Gonca Soysal, University of Texas at Dallas
Yu Wang, University of Texas at Dallas
ESTIMATION AND REVENUE OPTIMIZATION FOR SEARCH-BASED CHOICE SETTINGS
Ramnath Vaidyanathan, Desautels Faculty of Management, McGill University
Dan Zhang, Desautels Faculty of Management, McGill University
MAXIMIZING PURCHASE CONVERSION BY MINIMIZING CHOICE DEFERRAL
Jeff Larson, Brigham Young University
Jeff Dotson , Vanderbilt University
Mark Ratchford, Vanderbilt University
Disclaimer
The Research Opportunity webinars are posted here for a research-focused audience and should not be quoted, paraphrased or otherwise utilized without written permission of Analytics at Wharton. Any media inquiries or requests for quotes about the projects should be directed to analytics@wharton.upenn.edu.