It is critical for firms to understand how demand for their products is impacted by the way in which product information is communicated. Despite research devoted to understanding how the provision of information impacts product evaluation and choice, research on the communication of product specifications is limited. Firms often use esoteric specifications to describe attributes. In contrast to conventional specifications that are familiar and relatively easy to evaluate, esoteric specifications are defined as descriptions of product attributes that are unfamiliar, novel, and difficult to evaluate even when comparable alternatives are available to act as reference points. For example, the 'zoom' attribute of a digital camera may be described in a simple, easy-to-evaluate specification (e.g., 7x), or equivalently described in an esoteric, difficult-to-evaluate way (e.g., 37-260mm).
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