Honesty only gets you so far! The effect of two-sided content on re-purchase intentions

Abstract

A classical premise in the study of advertising is that two-sided ads that provide both positive and negative information about the products enhance purchase likelihood of the sponsored brands. Through a mix of analytical models and behavioral experiments, we show that two-sided content may in fact decrease the likelihood of re-purchase. This work sheds light on using two-sided content more effectively in the long-run by taking into account both consumers' own experiences and the effect of either ads or reviews.