Paying for Prominence
研究了企业如何通过支付佣金、在比价网站做广告或利用现有客户关系来影响消费者考虑产品的顺序，从而获得突出地位。
We investigate how firms can become ‘prominent’ and thereby influence the order in which consumers consider options. First, firms can affect sales efforts by means of commission payments, in which case the salesman steers consumers towards expensive products. Second, sellers can advertise prices on a price comparison website, so that consumers investigate the suitability of products in order of increasing price. Here, prices are lower when search costs are higher. Finally, consumers might first consider their existing supplier for subsequent purchases, which suggests a relatively benign rationale for the prevalence of cross-selling in markets such as retail banking.