IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/wly/soecon/v72y2005i2p305-328.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Seller Reputation, Information Signals, and Prices for Heterogeneous Coins on eBay

Author

Listed:
  • Mikhail I. Melnik
  • James Alm

Abstract

In online commerce, a buyer cannot directly examine the product and has to trust the seller for the product description and delivery. The reputation of the seller (and other information signals on the quality of the product) can therefore affect the buyer's willingness to pay. However, while the impact of reputation on willingness to pay for homogeneous goods has been examined, its impact on heterogeneous goods (where there is more uncertainty about product quality) is largely unknown. This paper examines the effects of reputation in online auctions, using U.S. silver Morgan dollar coins in “Almost Uncirculated” condition that are sold on eBay. Empirical results indicate that a seller's overall reputation has a positive impact on a buyer's willingness to pay, that negative comments about a seller often have a negative impact, and that these reputational effects increase in importance when there is more uncertainty about the quality of the coin.

Suggested Citation

  • Mikhail I. Melnik & James Alm, 2005. "Seller Reputation, Information Signals, and Prices for Heterogeneous Coins on eBay," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 72(2), pages 305-328, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:wly:soecon:v:72:y:2005:i:2:p:305-328
    DOI: 10.1002/j.2325-8012.2005.tb00704.x
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1002/j.2325-8012.2005.tb00704.x
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1002/j.2325-8012.2005.tb00704.x?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Patrick Bajari & Ali Hortaçsu, 2004. "Economic Insights from Internet Auctions," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 42(2), pages 457-486, June.
    2. Holt, Charles A & Sherman, Roger, 1990. "Advertising and Product Quality in Posted-Offer Experiments," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 28(1), pages 39-56, January.
    3. Cynthia G. McDonald & V. Carlos Slawson, 2002. "Reputation in An Internet Auction Market," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 40(4), pages 633-650, October.
    4. Klein, Benjamin & Leffler, Keith B, 1981. "The Role of Market Forces in Assuring Contractual Performance," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 89(4), pages 615-641, August.
    5. Amemiya, Takeshi, 1984. "Tobit models: A survey," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 24(1-2), pages 3-61.
    6. Camerer, Colin & Weigelt, Keith, 1988. "Experimental Tests of a Sequential Equilibrium Reputation Model," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 56(1), pages 1-36, January.
    7. Miller, Ross M & Plott, Charles R, 1985. "Product Quality Signaling in Experimental Markets," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 53(4), pages 837-872, July.
    8. DeJong, Douglas V & Forsythe, Robert & Lundholm, Russell J, 1985. "Ripoffs, Lemons, and Reputation Formation in Agency Relationships: A Laboratory Market Study," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 40(3), pages 809-820, July.
    9. Franklin Allen, 1984. "Reputation and Product Quality," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 15(3), pages 311-327, Autumn.
    10. Katkar Rama & Reiley David H, 2007. "Public versus Secret Reserve Prices in eBay Auctions: Results from a Pokémon Field Experiment," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 5(2), pages 1-25, January.
    11. Carl Shapiro, 1983. "Premiums for High Quality Products as Returns to Reputations," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 98(4), pages 659-679.
    12. Stuart Landon & Constance E. Smith, 1998. "Quality Expectations, Reputation, and Price," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 64(3), pages 628-647, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Barbos, Andrei & Hartman, John, 2023. "Reputational effects on third-party agents: A study of the market for fine and rare wines," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 208(C), pages 359-372.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Christopher Schlägel & Birgitta Wolff, 2007. "Country-Specific Effects of Reputation and Information: A Comparison of Online Auctions in Germany, the UK, and the US," FEMM Working Papers 07027, Otto-von-Guericke University Magdeburg, Faculty of Economics and Management.
    2. Butler, Jeffrey V. & Carbone, Enrica & Conzo, Pierluigi & Spagnolo, Giancarlo, 2020. "Past performance and entry in procurement: An experimental investigation," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 173(C), pages 179-195.
    3. Paul Resnick & Richard Zeckhauser & John Swanson & Kate Lockwood, 2006. "The value of reputation on eBay: A controlled experiment," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 9(2), pages 79-101, June.
    4. John A. List, 2006. "The Behavioralist Meets the Market: Measuring Social Preferences and Reputation Effects in Actual Transactions," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 114(1), pages 1-37, February.
    5. Grund Christian & Gürtler Oliver, 2008. "The Effect of Reputation on Selling Prices in Auctions," Journal of Economics and Statistics (Jahrbuecher fuer Nationaloekonomie und Statistik), De Gruyter, vol. 228(4), pages 345-356, August.
    6. Gary Bolton & Ben Greiner & Axel Ockenfels, 2013. "Engineering Trust: Reciprocity in the Production of Reputation Information," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 59(2), pages 265-285, January.
    7. Giorgio Coricelli & Luigi Luini, 1999. "Double Moral Hazard: an Experiment on Warranties," CEEL Working Papers 9901, Cognitive and Experimental Economics Laboratory, Department of Economics, University of Trento, Italia.
    8. Cai, Hongbin & Jin, Ginger Zhe & Liu, Chong & Zhou, Li-an, 2014. "Seller reputation: From word-of-mouth to centralized feedback," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 34(C), pages 51-65.
    9. Dieter Pennerstorfer & Christoph Weiss & Andreas Huber, 2019. "Experts, Reputation and Umbrella Effects: Empirical Evidence from Wine Prices," Economics working papers 2019-08, Department of Economics, Johannes Kepler University Linz, Austria.
    10. Luisa Menapace & GianCarlo Moschini, 2012. "Quality certification by geographical indications, trademarks and firm reputation," European Review of Agricultural Economics, Oxford University Press and the European Agricultural and Applied Economics Publications Foundation, vol. 39(4), pages 539-566, September.
    11. Cremer, Jacques & Khalil, Fahad, 1992. "Gathering Information before Signing a Contract," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 82(3), pages 566-578, June.
    12. Khurshed, Arif & Kostas, Dimitris & Mohamed, Abdulkadir & Saadouni, Brahim, 2018. "Initial public offerings on the UK when-issued market," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 49(C), pages 1-14.
    13. Martin Gaynor, "undated". "What Do We Know About Competition and Quality in Health Care Markets?," GSIA Working Papers 2006-E62, Carnegie Mellon University, Tepper School of Business.
    14. W. Bentley MacLeod, 2006. "Reputations, Relationships and the Enforcement of Incomplete Contracts," CESifo Working Paper Series 1730, CESifo.
    15. Rasmusen, Eric, 2017. "A model of trust in quality and North–South trade," Research in Economics, Elsevier, vol. 71(1), pages 159-170.
    16. Chrysanthos Dellarocas, 2003. "The Digitization of Word of Mouth: Promise and Challenges of Online Feedback Mechanisms," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 49(10), pages 1407-1424, October.
    17. Kretschmer, Tobias & Peukert, Christian, 2014. "Video killed the radio star? Online music videos and digital music sales," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 60276, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    18. Olivier Gergaud & Florine Livat, 2004. "Team versus individual reputations: a model of interaction and some empirical evidence," Cahiers de la Maison des Sciences Economiques bla04015, Université Panthéon-Sorbonne (Paris 1).
    19. Fabrice Etilé & Sabrina Teyssier, 2012. "Signaling Corporate Social Responsibility: Third-Party Certification vs. Brands," PSE Working Papers halshs-00736551, HAL.
    20. Dhillon, Amrita & Rigolini, Jamele, 2011. "Development and the interaction of enforcement institutions," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 95(1), pages 79-87.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:wly:soecon:v:72:y:2005:i:2:p:305-328. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://doi.org/10.1002/(ISSN)2325-8012 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.