“Driving” Platform Growth through Featured Vehicle Wraps: The Impact of Out-of-Home Advertising
Release time：04 June 2025
Jun
06
|
Time & Date
|
10:30 am
-
12:00 pm,
June
06,
2025
(Friday)
|
| Topic: | “Driving” Platform Growth through Featured Vehicle Wraps: The Impact of Out-of-Home Advertising |
| Time&Date: | 10:30 am -12:00 pm, June 6, 2025 (Friday) |
| Venue | Room 504, Teaching Complex D Building |
| Speaker: |
Sha Yang University of Southern California |
| Abstract: | Despite its significance and widespread use, out-of-home (OOH) advertising remains relatively underexplored in academic research. In this study, we leverage a novel empirical setting in which a leading on-demand freight delivery platform in China implemented a policy encouraging drivers to apply vehicle wraps featuring the platform's logo. This policy allows us to examine the effects of OOH advertising in a platform-based service market and gain a nuanced understanding of the mechanisms driving these effects. Operating as a freight equivalent of Uber, the platform connects consumers with van and truck drivers for intra-city goods transportation. It implements a vehicle wrap encouragement policy in a city following a period without such regulation. To assess the impact of this intervention, we use cities where the vehicle wrap policy was implemented between June 2020 and May 2021 as the treatment group, and those without the policy during the same period as the control group. Employing a Staggered Difference-in-Differences estimation, we assess the impact of increased OOH advertising on platform performance and participant behaviors. The findings reveal two key insights. First, the vehicle wrap advertising significantly increased the volume of transactions, as measured by completed orders. This effect materialized immediately and exhibited a rapid intensification, reaching its peak momentum of growth by the third month. Further analysis indicates that vehicle wraps primarily functioned as visibility tools by effectively expanding brand awareness among non-users (i.e. an extensive margin effect) and had a limited impact on deepening engagement among existing platform participants (i.e., an intensive margin effect). Second, we identify an unintended adverse consequence of the vehicle wrap advertising policy: an increase in driver turnover probability. This effect likely stems from an imbalance between supply and demand, as the policy disproportionately attracted more driver fulfillment requests than consumer order requests. Consequently, the resulting excess supply intensified competition among drivers, which, in turn, was positively associated with driver attrition. These findings contribute to a broader understanding of OOH advertising effectiveness, particularly in platform-based service markets. The study underscores both the potential benefits and unintended consequences of such interventions, offering valuable insights for firms considering similar advertising strategies. |
| Biography: | Sha Yang is the Ernest Hahn Professor of Marketing at the Marshall School of Business, University of Southern California. Professor Yang’s research centers on understanding interdependencies and spillovers in preferences, behaviors, and decision-making. Her work delves into the social influences exerted by family members, neighbors, friends, and other consumers in general. Additionally, she has studied competition in contexts such as advertising, pricing, and platform growth. Her recent research interests include causal inference and topics within the media and entertainment industries. Her scholarly contributions have been widely published in top-tier journals. Professor Yang has been an Associate Editor for Journal of Marketing since 2017, and served as an Associate Editor for Marketing Science during 2017-2024. She received honors such as the Marketing Science Institute Young Scholar and grants from various institutions. She served as the Vice Dean and Senior Vice Dean for Faculty and Academic Affairs of the Marshall School of Business during 2020-2023. She is currently a VP for the INFORMS Society for Marketing Science. |
