Portrait image for Elisabeth Honka

Elisabeth Honka

Associate Professor of Marketing
“When shopping for and purchasing financial products, such as insurance, consumer search plays an important role, and my research seeks to create understanding from that perspective.”
(310) 825-0296
Areas of Expertise:
  • Econometrics
  • Data Analytics
  • Marketing Management
  • Predictive Modeling
  • Research
About
 

Biography

Associate Professor of Marketing Elisabeth Honka joined the UCLA Anderson faculty in 2015 after spending four years as an assistant professor at the University of Texas in Dallas’ Jindal School of Management. Her research interests include consumer search and, more generally, empirical industrial organization across a variety of sectors, including financial services such as auto insurance and retail banking.

Honka’s research interests date back to her time as a Ph.D. student at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business, where she earned her doctorate in 2010. “The empirical IO class during my second year sparked my interest in consumer search. I had just purchased my first car, and had done price quoting for insurance,” she says. “Going through the process of obtaining price quotes for auto insurance showed me that the auto insurance industry would be an excellent context to study consumer search and led to a paper I wrote during my second year. From there, my interest increased and I wrote my dissertation on that subject.”

In the classroom, Honka teaches pricing for UCLA Anderson’s full-time MBA and FEMBA programs.

Education

Ph.D. Marketing, 2004 – 2010, University of Chicago Booth School of Business

MBA, 2004 – 2010, University of Chicago Booth School of Business

Lic. oec., Economics, 1999 – 2004, University of St. Gallen (Switzerland)

Publications

E Honka, S Seiler, R Ursu. 2024. Consumer Search: What Can We Learn from Pre-Purchase Data? Journal of Retailing (forthcoming).

E Honka. 2023. Discussion of 'Risk Preference Types, Limited Consideration, and Welfare' by Levon Barseghyan and Francesca Molinari. Journal of Business & Economic Statistics 41(4), 1039 - 1041.

M Ameri, E Honka, Y Xie. 2023. From Strangers to Friends: Tie Formations and Online Activities in an Evolving Social Network.  Journal of Marketing Research 60 (2), 329 - 354.

R Ursu, Q Zhang, E Honka. 2023. Search Gaps and Consumer Fatigue. Marketing Science 42(1), 110 - 136.

Y Tsai, E Honka. 2021. Informational and Non-Informational Advertising Content. Marketing Science 40(6), 1030 – 1058.

D Yavorsky, E Honka, K Chen. 2021. Consumer Search in the U.S. Auto Industry: The Role of Dealership Visits. Quantitative Marketing and Economics 19(1), 1-52.

M Ameri, E Honka, Y Xie. 2019. Word-of-Mouth, Observed Adoptions and Anime Watching Decisions: The Role of the Personal versus the Community Network. Marketing Science 38(4), 567-583.

A Aribarg, T Otter, D Zantedeschi, G Allenby, T Bentley, D Curry, M Dotson, T Henderson, E Honka, R Kohli, K Jedidi, S Seiler, X Wang. 2018. Advancing Non-Compensatory Choice Models in Marketing. Customer Needs and Solutions 5(1), 82 - 92. 

E Honka, A Hortacsu, M Vitorino. 2017. Advertising, Consumer Awareness, and Choice: Evidence from the U.S. Banking Industry. The RAND Journal of Economics 48(3), 611-646.

E Honka, P Chintagunta. 2017. Simultaneous or Sequential? Search Strategies in the US Auto Insurance Industry. Marketing Science 36(1), 21-42.

E Honka. 2014. Quantifying Search and Switching Costs in the US Auto Insurance Industry. The RAND Journal of Economics 45(4), 847-884.

P Manchanda, E Honka. 2005. The Effects and Role of Direct-to-Physician Marketing in the Pharmaceutical Industry: An Integrative Review. Yale J. Health Pol'y L. & Ethics 5(2), 785-822.

Working Papers

M Paridar, M Ameri, E Honka. 2023. More, Faster, and Better? Effects of Rewards on Incentivizing the Creation of User-Generated Content.

M Ameri, E Honka, Y Xie. 2023. Watching Intensity and Media Franchise Engagement.

R Ursu, S Seiler, E Honka. 2023. The Sequential Search Model: A Framework for Empirical Research.

L Zhang, R Ursu, E Honka, O Yao. 2023. Product Discovery and Consumer Search Routes: Evidence from a Mobile App.

E Honka, Y Tsai. 2022. Coordination between Pricing and Advertising: Empirical Evidence from the U.S. Auto Insurance Industry.