Ordered Consumer Search

The paper discusses situations in which consumers search through their options in a deliberate order, in contrast to more familiar models with random search. Topicsinclude: the existence of ordered search equilibria with symmetric sellers (all consumers first inspect the seller they anticipate sets the lowest price, and a seller whichis inspected first by consumers will set the lowest price); the use of price and non-price advertising to direct search; the impact of consumers starting a new search attheir previous supplier; and the incentive a seller can have to raise its own searchcost. I also show how ordered search can be reformulated as a simpler discrete choiceproblem without search frictions or dynamic decision making.