Marketing

- Featured Publication
Frontiers: Can an AI Algorithm Mitigate Racial Economic Inequality? An Analysis in the Context of Airbnb

By: Shunyuan Zhang, Nitin Mehta, Param Singh and Kannan Srinivasan

Nominated for the 2022 John D. C. Little Award.

They study the effect of Airbnb’s smart-pricing algorithm on the racial disparity in the daily revenue earned by Airbnb hosts. Their empirical strategy exploits Airbnb’s introduction of the algorithm and its voluntary adoption by hosts as a quasi-natural experiment.
- Featured Publication
Frontiers: Can an AI Algorithm Mitigate Racial Economic Inequality? An Analysis in the Context of Airbnb

By: Shunyuan Zhang, Nitin Mehta, Param Singh and Kannan Srinivasan

Nominated for the 2022 John D. C. Little Award.

They study the effect of Airbnb’s smart-pricing algorithm on the racial disparity in the daily revenue earned by Airbnb hosts. Their empirical strategy exploits Airbnb’s introduction of the algorithm and its voluntary adoption by hosts as a quasi-natural experiment.
- Featured Case
Hometown Foods: Changing Price Amid Inflation Case

By: Julian De Freitas, Jeremy Yang, and Das Narayandas

During the early part of the 2021 Covid-19 pandemic, Hometown Foods, a large seller of flour-based products, thrived as consumers hoarded baked goods and took up baking to pass the time and find comfort. Then, amid growing shortages in commodities, a vaccine arrived, businesses began to re-open, and consumers benefited from federal relief aid. This perfect storm of high demand amid stock shortages generated the highest inflation in 13 years.
- Featured Case
Hometown Foods: Changing Price Amid Inflation Case

By: Julian De Freitas, Jeremy Yang, and Das Narayandas

During the early part of the 2021 Covid-19 pandemic, Hometown Foods, a large seller of flour-based products, thrived as consumers hoarded baked goods and took up baking to pass the time and find comfort. Then, amid growing shortages in commodities, a vaccine arrived, businesses began to re-open, and consumers benefited from federal relief aid....
- Award
Winner of the 2016 Case Centre Award in the Marketing category for “The New York Times Paywall” (HBS Case 512-077).

By: Sunil Gupta, Vineet Kumar, Bharat Anand, and Felix Oberholzer-Gee

The Case Centre Awards and Competitions recognize worldwide excellence in case writing and teaching, and are considered the case community's annual 'Oscars'. The winners of this category are the Marketing cases that were used in the largest number of organizations across the globe in the preceding calendar year.
- Award
Winner of the 2016 Case Centre Award in the Marketing category for “The New York Times Paywall” (HBS Case 512-077).

By: Sunil Gupta, Vineet Kumar, Bharat Anand, and Felix Oberholzer-Gee

The Case Centre Awards and Competitions recognize worldwide excellence in case writing and teaching, and are considered the case community's annual 'Oscars'. The winners of this category are the Marketing cases that were used in the largest number of organizations across the globe in the preceding calendar year.
- Featured Case
FARM Rio: Bringing a Brazilian Fashion Brand to the World

By: Isamar Troncoso and Jill Avery

FARM Rio, a twenty-six year old Brazilian fashion brand had recently put down roots in the U.S. The brand, known for its bold, colorful, nature-inspired tropical prints, was testing the waters in Europe to assess if and how the brand should further expand globally. Balancing two different geographic markets was proving to be more challenging than expected and the team had needed to make changes to the brand's name and positioning, price points, and its product quality, styles, and fits to accommodate the needs of retailers and consumers in the U.S.

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- Featured Case
FARM Rio: Bringing a Brazilian Fashion Brand to the World

By: Isamar Troncoso and Jill Avery

FARM Rio, a twenty-six year old Brazilian fashion brand had recently put down roots in the U.S. The brand, known for its bold, colorful, nature-inspired tropical prints, was testing the waters in Europe to assess if and how the brand should further expand globally. Balancing two different geographic markets was proving to be more challenging than...

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- Award
Outstanding Case Teacher

By: Anita Elberse

This world-wide Case Centre competition recognizes an excellent practitioner in the case classroom.

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- Award
Outstanding Case Teacher

By: Anita Elberse

This world-wide Case Centre competition recognizes an excellent practitioner in the case classroom.

More Information

About the Unit

Marketing is critical for organic growth of a business and its central role is in creating, communicating, capturing and sustaining value for an organization. Marketing helps a firm in creating value by better understanding the needs of its customers and providing them with innovative products and services. This value is communicated through a variety of channels as well as through the firm's branding strategy. Effective management of customers and pricing allows the firm to capture part of the value it has created. Finally, by building an effective customer-centric organization a firm attempts to sustain value over time.

Our faculty addresses a broad array of topics in all of these areas. Our work attempts to get a better understanding of how consumers use information and make choices and how these choices affect the firm's strategy for new product development, customer relationship management, branding and other marketing efforts. We examine issues related to branding, business marketing, global marketing, distribution channels, pricing, direct and interactive marketing, sales management and return on marketing investment. Some of our faculty specializes in specific industries such as retailing, agribusiness, social enterprise, media, arts and entertainment.

There are several new developments in marketing that offer opportunities for us to make important contributions in the future. The current economic crisis is changing consumers' current and future purchase and consumption patterns. Search engines have changed the way consumers obtain information and make decisions and they are also dramatically changing the advertising industry. Social networks and user generated content have opened a new way for consumers to engage with each other as well as with brands and companies. There are significant changes in the attitudes of consumers and companies about social issues. Consumer preferences and choice of products are increasingly influenced by social factors. Companies are recognizing that there is a large market at the "bottom of the pyramid" and marketing to these consumers may require a new framework. These and related developments provide great opportunities for the marketing faculty to make a significant impact in the future.

Recent Publications

Adobe: GenAI - Threat or Opportunity (B)

By: Sunil Gupta, Rajiv Lal and Ruth Page

December 2025 |
Supplement |
Faculty Research

[PRE ABSTRACT] Instructors should consider the timing of making the videos available to students, as they may reveal key case details. [ABSTRACT] In December 2022, Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen faced a pivotal strategic decision due to the rapid rise of generative AI image models from OpenAI, Midjourney, and Dall-E. Adobe, a leader in digital media and marketing software with a 40-year legacy of innovation and successful adaptation recognized GenAI as both an opportunity and a threat to its core business. Many creative professionals, a critical Adobe customer segment, had expressed deep concerns over GenAI models trained through data mined from the internet, raising ethical and trust-related issues. The case supplement contains 9 videos and one exhibit which explore the deliberations of Narayen and his leadership team: Did GenAI represent a threat or an opportunity? Should Adobe partner with or acquire an existing model, or should it build its own GenAI model? If Adobe chose to build, how might it responsibly train the models to protect its trusted relationship with enterprise and creative professional customers while keeping its leadership position in the industry? Should Adobe always restrict the models to commercially safe content or were there use cases when it would allow the models to scrap the broad internet of data? How would Adobe monetize GenAI? Three years in, how had Adobe’s products offerings changed? What was the market response? How did Adobe’s corporate culture influence the company’s response?

Keywords: AI and Machine Learning; Ethics; Corporate Strategy; Customer Relationship Management; Leading Change; Digital Platforms; Digital Transformation; Technology Adoption; Intellectual Property; Information Technology Industry; Publishing Industry; Advertising Industry; Technology Industry

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You’re Probably A/B Testing Too Much. Here’s What to Do Instead.

By: Tomomichi Amano and Joonhwi Joo

December 4, 2025 |
Other Article |
Harvard Business Review

A/B testing, once heralded as the gold standard for data-driven decision-making, often slows companies down due to an overemphasis on statistical significance. Traditional approaches require waiting for weeks, leading to missed opportunities, and delayed growth. This caution, while appropriate for fields like drug development, is misaligned with business needs, where the real cost is often the opportunity lost rather than the risk of a small mistake. A new framework prioritizes minimizing worst-case expected loss in business terms such as dollars or conversions, rather than abstract probabilities. It enables faster, more strategic decisions by recommending action whenever the estimated impact is positive and the deployment cost is justified. It also reduces the need for excessive data collection, saving both time and money.

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BrandBastion: Managing Online Brand Communities

By: Julian De Freitas

December 2025 |
Supplement |
Faculty Research

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AI Companions for Dementia

By: Julian De Freitas

2025 |
Article |
Nature Mental Health

Dementia affects over 55 million people worldwide, and AI companions powered by large language models are emerging as a scalable option for prevention and care. The current work considers the unique promise, concerns, and regulation of AI companions for dementia.

Keywords: Health Care and Treatment; AI and Machine Learning

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Most AI Initiatives Fail. This 5-Part Framework Can Help.

By: Ayelet Israeli and Eva Ascarza

November 20, 2025 |
Article |
Harvard Business Review (website)

Most AI initiatives fail not because the models are weak, but because organizations aren’t built to sustain them. A large Latin American conglomerate developed a simple management system that aligns roles, responsibilities, and routines so AI projects move from isolated pilots to enterprise-wide impact. Its approach shows that scaling AI is less about technology and more about creating the organizational backbone that turns experiments into measurable business results.

Keywords: Artificial Intelligence; AI; AI and Machine Learning; Change Management; Leadership; Organizational Structure; Latin America

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Eplay: Measuring Customer Acquisition Cost

By: Eva Ascarza and Daniel McCarthy

November 2025 |
Supplement |
Faculty Research

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BrandBastion: Managing Online Brand Communities

By: Julian De Freitas

November 2025 |
Teaching Note |
Faculty Research

Teaching Note for HBS Case No. 526-013.

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Eplay: Measuring Customer Acquisition Cost

By: Eva Ascarza and Daniel McCarthy

November 2025 |
Case |
Faculty Research

In June 2025, Sara Chen, Chief Marketing Officer of Eplay—a fast-growing e-commerce startup selling educational toys—faced mounting pressure to clarify the company’s true Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC). While sales and brand awareness were rising, profitability remained out of reach, and the leadership team disagreed on how CAC should be measured: Marketing favored a narrow metric tied only to acquisition-focused digital ad spend, while Finance argued for a more expansive view that incorporated all advertising, content creation, direct mail, and sales team expenses. Chen now confronted a strategic dilemma: What analytical approach to CAC would best capture the real economics of Eplay’s growth, and how should that framework guide the company’s allocation of marketing investments and decisions about scaling efficiently?

Keywords: Business Startups; E-commerce; Marketing; Profit; Consumer Products Industry