Information competition in product launch: Evidence from the movie industry.

Social media is an important platform for product launch and generates rich information for decision making. However, few studies have considered social information to have a competitive effect. In this study, we focused on the competition effects of social information in different product launch stages. We refined social information analysis to the product-feature level. Using data from the Chinese movie market, we developed several models in experiments. Our results indicate that competitors’ social opinions are important for focused product sales. Search volume moderates the effect between social opinion and product sales. Simultaneously, incorporating product-feature-level social information regarding comparative products in the model will improve the model’s predictive power over product sales. These results have both theoretical and practical implications.