Prices and Reviews as Information Cues in E-Commerce Recommender Systems

Online retailers widely use prices and reviews, as additional information cues along with thumbnail pictures, when making product recommendations to consumers. They may use both prices and reviews (“dual cues”), either one (“single cue”), or simply display pictures of recommended products. The authors conducted a field experiment at a US online retailer to examine how the number of information cues in product recommender systems (i.e., no prices or reviews, single cue, dual cue) affects consumers’ search engagement and purchases. Results showed a nonlinear purchase effect: Providing information cues was better than not providing them; single cue conditions resulted in higher transaction values than dual cue conditions and also kindled more pre-purchase search activities, such as recommender impressions and clicks, non-recommender product views, and engagement with the keyword search tool. Further, increased search frictions in single cue conditions stimulated consumers’ search engagement, whereas reduced search frictions in dual cue conditions facilitated consumer rejection of recommended products that did not match consumer preferences. The findings imply that marketers can use information cues strategically in recommendation systems to create search frictions by withholding some information to motivate consumers to engage more in the search process, potentially leading to more purchases