Subscriptions versus one-off purchases: the impact of fee-charging models on consumer privacy concerns
International Journal of Bank Marketing
ISSN: 0265-2323
Article publication date: 11 April 2023
Issue publication date: 23 May 2023
Abstract
Purpose
With the popularity of paid apps and increasing concerns about privacy hazards, this paper aims to investigate the impact of mobile services’ fee-charging models on consumers’ privacy concerns, and generate insights for app developers’ fee-charging strategies.
Design/methodology/approach
Three experimental studies including 550 participants were conducted. All studies were between-subjects designs and based on the context of financial mobile services. The implementations of fee-charging models were manipulated by both visualized and test-based stimuli.
Findings
The results reveal that consumers are less concerned about potential privacy violations when using subscription-based (vs. purchase-based) financial mobile services (study 1). This effect is mediated by consumers’ perceptions that app developers that charge subscription fees (vs. one-off prices) are more likely to be consumer-serving motivated (study 2 and 3).
Originality/value
This paper advances the current understanding of consumer response toward paid apps, by proposing and testing a novel attribution-based mechanism to explain why the implementation of a subscription-based versus purchase-based fee-charging model can result in more favorable consumer reactions. Furthermore, this paper identifies the implementation of contrasting fee-charging models as a market-related factor that affects the extent to which consumers are concerned about potential privacy violations, extending extant literature on consumer privacy concern.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
The authors gratefully acknowledge the grants supported by National Science Foundation of China (71672063, 72072065, and 72072152) and City University of Hong Kong SRG (7005478 and 7005791) for financial support.
Citation
Yan, C., Yang, Z. and Dai, X. (2023), "Subscriptions versus one-off purchases: the impact of fee-charging models on consumer privacy concerns", International Journal of Bank Marketing, Vol. 41 No. 4, pp. 835-859. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJBM-06-2022-0271
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
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