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New, Like New, or Very Good? Reputation and Credibility

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  • Bruno Jullien
  • In-Uck Park

Abstract

We show that sellers may earn a reputation for their “ability” to deliver high-quality goods on average by honestly announcing the realized quality of items for sale every period. As the expected revenue stream from continuing with honest communication increases with their ability, high-ability sellers remain honest while low-ability sellers find it too costly and sometimes lie about quality for short-term gain. Thus, cheap-talk communication facilitates the market's learning of a seller's ability and strengthens reputation effects. We study this new reputation mechanism and the induced market dynamics, first when sellers cannot restart with a new identity and second when they can. We extend the analysis to various other situations such as voluntary refund and moral hazard.

Suggested Citation

  • Bruno Jullien & In-Uck Park, 2014. "New, Like New, or Very Good? Reputation and Credibility," Review of Economic Studies, Oxford University Press, vol. 81(4), pages 1543-1574.
  • Handle: RePEc:oup:restud:v:81:y:2014:i:4:p:1543-1574
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    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1093/restud/rdu012
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    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. Jullien, Bruno & Park, In-Uck, 2019. "Communication, Feedbacks and Repeated Moral Hazard with Short-lived Buyers," TSE Working Papers 19-1027, Toulouse School of Economics (TSE), revised Apr 2020.
    2. Jolivet, Grégory & Jullien, Bruno & Postel-Vinay, Fabien, 2016. "Reputation and prices on the e-market: Evidence from a major French platform," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 59-75.
    3. Schottmüller, Christoph, 2019. "Too good to be truthful: Why competent advisers are fired," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 181(C), pages 333-360.
    4. Jeremy Bertomeu & Davide Cianciaruso, 2018. "Verifiable disclosure," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 65(4), pages 1011-1044, June.
    5. Behnud Djawadi & Rene Fahr & Claus-Jochen Haake & Sonja Recker, 2017. "Maintaing vs. Milking Good Reputation when Customer Feedback is Inaccurate," Working Papers CIE 106, Paderborn University, CIE Center for International Economics.
    6. Martin, Simon & Shelegia, Sandro, 2021. "Underpromise and overdeliver? - Online product reviews and firm pricing," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).
    7. Behnud Mir Djawadi & René Fahr & Claus-Jochen Haake & Sonja Recker, 2018. "Maintaining vs. milking good reputation when customer feedback is inaccurate," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 13(11), pages 1-23, November.
    8. Drew Fudenberg & Ying Gao & Harry Pei, 2020. "A Reputation for Honesty," Papers 2011.07159, arXiv.org.
    9. Evan Magnusson, 2022. "Unboxing the Causal Effect of Ratings on Product Demand: Evidence from Wayfair.com," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 70(3), pages 525-564, September.
    10. Astaiza-Gómez, José Gabriel, 2021. "The Effects of Investors' Information Acquisition On Sell-Side Analysts Forecast Bias," MPRA Paper 110059, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    11. Klein, Nicolas & Mylovanov, Tymofiy, 2017. "Will truth out?—An advisor’s quest to appear competent," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 72(C), pages 112-121.
    12. Choi, Jay Pil & Kristiansen, Eirik Gaard & Nahm, Jae, 2017. "Communication of soft information: Reputation and imperfect enforcement of reporting quality," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 136(C), pages 91-106.
    13. Bernardita Vial & Felipe Zurita, 2017. "Entrants' Reputation And Industry Dynamics," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 58(2), pages 529-559, May.

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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • C73 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory - - - Stochastic and Dynamic Games; Evolutionary Games
    • D82 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Asymmetric and Private Information; Mechanism Design
    • D83 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Search; Learning; Information and Knowledge; Communication; Belief; Unawareness
    • L14 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - Transactional Relationships; Contracts and Reputation

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