Mechanism Choice,Product Size And Pricing Decisions In Crowdfunding

Crowdfunding is an innovative way of financing,which aims to solve the financing problems of enterprises or individuals.Reward-based crowdfunding is a kind of crowdfunding that takes creative products as the way of return,which can also be regarded as a new business mode.Whether the creator can attract enough consumers to purchase products depends on the success rate of the project.This dissertation focuses on reward-based crowdfunding,which aims to provide theoretical support for creators in mechanism choice and product decision.Specifically,this dissertation studies mechanism choice and pricing decision in crowdfunding based on consumers'psychological factors and their valuation;then,based on the signals of product quality,this dissertation studies the impact of informational cascade on the mechanism choice and pricing decision in crowdfunding;finally,combined with consumer valuation and demand,this studies package size and pricing decisions in crowdfunding.First of all,this dissertation characterizes the ambiguity effect and overfunding effect,establishes theoretical models under the sequential and simultaneous crowdfunding mechanisms,and sets optimal crowdfunding targets and product prices for creator.Under the sequential crowdfunding mechanism,the latter consumer can oboserve the former consumer's action;whlie under the simultaneous crowdfunding mechanism,the latter consumer can't see the former consumer's action.We find that the sequential crowdfunding mechanism is not always better than the simultaneous crowdfunding mechanism for the creator;however,the sequential crowdfunding mechanism is always better than the simultaneous crowdfunding mechanism for consumer surplus and social welfare;moreover,when the ambiguity level is high enough,the sequential crowdfunding mechanism is better than the counterpart for creator.Secondly,we develop N-period crowdfunding models under both the sequential crowdfunding mechanism and the simultaneous crowdfunding mechanism.By numerical analysis,we find that the sequential crowdfunding mechanism is not always better than the simultaneous crowdfunding mechanism for the creator and the success rate.Moreover,the success rate is not always decreasing in the number of consumers.Finally,we design a simple compensation mechanism to attact consumers.The results show that the compensation mechanism can improve the creator's expected payoffs under both crowdfunding mechanisms.Then,under the quality uncertainty,this dissertation assumes that consumers receive private signals about product quality,and consumer decisions will be affected by informational cascade in crowdfunding.Under the simultaneous crowdfunding mechanism,consumers make purchase decisions based on their valuation and private signals.While under the sequential crowdfunding mechanism,consumers make purchase decisions based on the impact of valuation,private signals and informational cascade.In this dissertation,we build the simultaneous crowdfunding model with the quality signals,and the optimal crowdfunding target and pricing strategy are set for the creator.Secondly,we establish a sequential crowdfunding model under the informational cascade,and set the optimal crowdfunding target and pricing strategy for crowdfunding creator.It is found that the creator can attract consumers to participate in crowdfunding by setting the optimal pricing strategy.Therefore,after considering the impact of informational cascade on consumer,the sequential crowdfunding mechanism is always better than the simultaneous crowdfunding mechanism.Finally,we study the package size and pricing decisions of products in crowdfunding based on consumer valuation and demand.When the package sizes are exogenous,we provide the optimal dual-package pricing strategy and single-package pricing strategy for the creator.The results show that the dual-package pricing strategy is not always better than the single-package pricing strategy.Moreover,a high crowdfunding target does harm to the creator's expected payoff.In addition,When the package size is endogenous,we obtain the optimal product size,product price and crowdfunding target for the creator.The results show that both the volume strategy and margin strategy may be the optimal under certain conditions,and both the success rate and the optimal price of large package will not increase in the upper bound of demand.The main contributions of this dissertation are as follows.First,we examine the impacts of two psychological effects on consumer purchase decisions under different crowdfunding mechanisms.Secondly,we study the impact of informational cascade on consumer purchase decisions when the quality of crowdfunding products is uncertain.Finally,we investigate the impacts of product size and price decisions on consumer purchase decisions in crowdfunding.According to the analysis of consumer behavior,we provide some managerial insights on mechanim choice,package size and pricing decisions for the creator.