Mobile Push versus Pull Targeting and Geo-Conquesting

This study contrasts the effectiveness of two distinct mobile content delivery mechanisms: mobile push and mobile pull. Mobile push describes a delivery mechanism where firm-initiated (ad) content is delivered to consumers. In contrast, mobile pull describes consumer-initiated requests for (ad) content. Building on cognitive load theory, we predict a higher effectiveness of mobile push as it reduces users’ cognitive load in decision environments with multiple choice options. Furthermore, we predict that the effectiveness of mobile push is moderated by usage experience and local competition. We test our hypotheses using a large-scale randomized field experiment involving two competing retail chains in a geo-conquesting setting as well as an online experiment. The field experiment includes customers who shop at retail stores belonging to a key competitor and aims to drive them into the stores of the focal retailer using mobile coupons. Consistent with our predictions, we find that mobile push increases the coupon redemption rate by 6.0 %. However, we find that the magnitude of responses to mobile push depends on the app-specific usage experience and local competition. For more experienced users, we show that mobile push decreases the likelihood of coupon redemption for consumers with prior usage experience. Regarding local competition, our results illustrate that mobile push increases the likelihood of coupon redemption in areas with higher store densities. The online experiment corroborates the findings from the field experiment and supports our assumptions of the underlying mechanism. Overall, these results have important implications for retailers and consumer packaged goods (CPG) brands