Communications of the ACM
Online Marketing Schemes Can Still Lure Customers
A study has found that online consumers remain susceptible to post-transaction marketing schemes.
Credit: big-momentum.com
Pennsylvania State University researchers have found that despite legislation and warnings, online consumers remain susceptible to post-transaction marketing schemes.
In such schemes, upon completing an online transaction, consumers are immediately redirected to a marketing offer from an affiliated marketer that, although unrelated to the previous transaction, is often made to appear that way. Consumers are generally asked to opt-in or opt-out of an additional offer, sometimes with data from the previous transaction used to prepopulate input fields such as an email address. Researchers say this latter tactic makes it more likely that consumers will believe the second offer is actually part of the previous transaction.
The researchers set up an online music store and gave 550 participants $1.50 to buy and download a 99-cent song, being told they could keep whatever was left when the transaction concluded. After buying a song, participants encountered a post-transaction offer page advertising a safe delivery service using various combinations of opt-in and opt-out tactics and the prepopulation of information fields. Forty percent bought the additional service and 50 percent said they believed the second offer was connected to the original transaction or thought it was unclear.
From Penn State News
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