Abstract: The outbreak of the epidemic has made the live streaming extremely popular, and many brand companies have also joined the live streaming. They not only cooperate with experts in live streaming, but also open their own self-live streaming room. As a result, the brand company has formed three live streaming modes, namely, the brand self-live streaming mode, the expert live streaming mode, and the mixed mode of both. However, not all live streaming modes are beneficial to a company's live revenue, especially when considering the impact of customer's waiting costs and word-of-mouth effects, thus, the question of when to choose the best live streaming mode is the focus of this study. By examining this question, we provide a theoretical reference for brand companies to choose a live mode based on customer demand and word-of-mouth effect, thus helping brand companies to choose the optimal live mode according to the real situation.
At first, the word-of-mouth effect of product (the word-of-mouth weight and the word-of-mouth value evaluation) and consumer's waiting cost are included into the consumer demand function in this paper. Then the game theory is used to construct the decision-making model of the brand company under the three live streaming modes, and optimal solutions in three live streaming modes are solved. Finally, the company's optimal profits in the three live streaming modes are compared to seek the best choice. This paper analyses the impact of consumer's waiting cost and word-of-mouth effect on the optimal live mode choice of brand companies. In addition, the influence of the anchor's influence on the optimal choice of live streaming mode is also analyzed through simulations.
The following conclusions are drawn from this study. (1)The word-of-mouth effect of product (both the word-of-mouth weight and the word-of-mouth value evaluation are high) is not necessarily good for the live streaming profits of the company. (2)Secondly, the choice of the optimal live streaming model of the company is not only affected by word of mouth, but also closely related to consumers waiting cost. When the consumer waiting cost is low, if the positive effect of word of mouth is not good (consumers do not value word of mouth or the value evaluation is low), the live streaming mode of cooperation with experts should be chosen. For example, The Zhong Xue Gao brand generated negative word-of-mouth due to the high price of ice-cream, resulting in a performance crisis, but achieved annual sales of 800 million with the promotion of Luo Yonghao, a celebrity anchor. If the positive effect of word-of-mouth is general (consumers do not value word-of-mouth but the value evaluation is high or consumers value word-of-mouth but the value evaluation is low), a mixed live streaming mode should be chosen. If the positive effect of word-of-mouth is significant (consumers pay more attention to word-of-mouth and the value evaluation is high), only the self-live streaming mode should be chosen. With consumer's waiting cost increasing, brand companies are more inclined to mixed live streaming modes, and for popular products that are predicted to sell out or where there is uncertainty about when the product will be available in the live streaming room, it is necessary to consider a hybrid model of live streaming, i.e., opening a brand self-streaming room to provide customers who are not willing to wait. (3)In addition, the influence of anchors will also affect the choice of the optimal live streaming mode of the brand company. If the cost of waiting for consumers is low, and a self-streaming anchor influence is greater, only open brand self-broadcast mode will be better. This also reflects why more and more brand companies often invite influential business leaders and so on to broadcast live from the broadcast room, such that the department of Xiaomi mobile phone sales invites Lei Jun to sit in the Xiaomi self-live streaming room; or L'Oreal and other brand companies gradually train internal professional anchors. However, with consumers waiting cost increasing, the mixed live streaming mode is the best choice.
In addition, two extended discussions have been made in this study. First, the paper further considers the question of firms' choice of the optimal live mode when waiting costs have a negative effect on the word-of-mouth effect, and finds that the findings do not change. This suggests that the findings of our study are more robust. Second, this study also discusses the revenue erosion effect generated by companies switching to the expert live streaming mode. More specifically, when the customer waiting cost is below a certain threshold, the opening of the expert live streaming mode erodes part of the market demand for the self-live streaming room, which indirectly leads to the revenue of expert live streaming room eroding the revenue of self-live streaming.

Key words: self-live streaming, experts-live streaming, word-of-mouth effect, waiting cost, anchor influence

摘要： 疫情的来袭使得直播带货盛极一时,众多品牌企业不仅通过达人主播销售产品,还纷纷开通了自播间销售产品,从而形成了品牌自播、达人直播、混合直播的三种直播模式。本文将顾客等待成本和产品口碑效应(口碑权重和口碑价值评估)考虑到顾客需求函数中,并通过博弈论构建了品牌企业在三种直播模式下的决策模型,比较了企业在三种直播模式下的最优收益。研究发现:当顾客等待成本低时,若口碑积极效应不佳(顾客不重视口碑或口碑价值评估低),可以考虑与达人合作直播;若口碑积极效应一般(顾客不重视口碑但口碑价值评估高或顾客重视口碑但口碑价值评估低),应开通混合直播模式;若口碑积极效应显著(顾客重视口碑且口碑价值评估高),应仅开通品牌自播间。而随着顾客等待成本的增大,品牌企业倾向选择混合模式。

关键词: 品牌自播, 达人直播, 口碑效应, 等待成本, 主播影响力