Uncertainty marketing tactics: An overview and a unifying framework

Many firms employ marketing tactics, such as surprise boxes, buy-and-reveal deals, random price promotions, and teaser advertisements, in which some information is intentionally undisclosed. Research has examined some of these initiatives, using a broad but often disconnected set of terms, theories, and methods, which we examine and integrate in this conceptual review paper. To lend coherence to the literature and offer a unifying framework for informing marketing practice, we (1) conceptualize these tactics as part of a broader phenomenon referred to as “uncertainty marketing” and define its boundaries, (2) propose and demonstrate that the range of uncertainty marketing tactics can be classified across three types (assortment, promotional, and innovation tactics) and along two core dimensions (stakes and opacity), and (3) examine how firms can obtain a favorable consumer response, thereby deriving testable propositions about consumers’ baseline interest in uncertainty marketing tactics and the factors that can affect this interest. We then discuss the implications of applying this framework in practice and close by offering a prioritized agenda for future research.