基于顾客退货行为的在线零售商定价与体验渠道策略

Optimal Pricing and Showroom Strategies of Online Retailers Faced with Product Returns

本文针对由供应商和拥有体验渠道的在线零售商组成的O2O系统,考虑消费者对产品是否满意不确定以及可能存在的退货行为,研究了在线零售商体验渠道策略与供应商合同菜单设计问题。基于消费者理性预期理论,构建了消费者期望效用函数,建立了不对称信息下在线零售商与供应商的两阶段动态博弈模型。通过模型求解,得到了供应商最优合同菜单设计、在线零售商最优定价和销售努力水平决策,进而考察了体验渠道的价值。结果表明:在线零售商引入体验渠道能扩大潜在市场需求规模,产品销量增加并降低产品退货率;若在线零售商以自身利润最大化为目标,由于体验渠道不会产生额外的产品库存、销售等成本,因而在线零售商总是有动机引入体验渠道,此时供应商和O2O系统利润水平也能得到有效提升;体验渠道的引入会吸引部分对产品估值较低的消费者体验产品,并会使部分消费者发生渠道迁移行为,有利于提升消费者福利。

This paper analyzes the optimal pricing policies,sales effort strategies and contracts design within a O2O mode that consists of a supplier and an online retailer.The online retailer offers a money-back guarantee,which allows customers to return unsatisfactory products to the online retailer for a full refund.Based on the rational expectations hypothesis,a function of consumers’expected utility and a two-stage dynamic game mode are constructed in this paper.By the solutions,we derive,for each participant,the optimal profit of system and the optimal equilibrium point among pricing,demands and profits.Then,we investigate the impact of the showroom on the consumer purchasing behaviors and consumer surplus.The results show that,the introduction of the showroom can increase the demand for the products and decrease product return rates,and it is favorable for the expected profit of the online retailer.Moreover,the introduction of showroom can effectively increase the supplier and system’s profit.Customers who give relatively low valuations will be attracted by the introduction of showroom,and thus consumer surplus can be increased.