Marketing Leners 6:2 (1995): 137-147

1995 Kluwer Academic Publishers, Manufactured in the Netherlands

Market Segmentation with Choice-Based

Conjoint Analysis
WAYNE S. DESARBO
School of Business Administration, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1234

VENKATRAM RAMASWAMY
School of Business Administration, University of Michigan

STEVEN H. COHEN
Stra(ford Associates, Boston, MA

Key words: Choiee experiments; conjoint analysis; market segmentation

Abstract

Choice-based conjoint analysis has increased in popularity in recent years among marketing practifioners. The
typical practice is to estimate choice-based conjoint models at the aggregate level, given insufficient data for
individuaMevel estimationof part-worths. We discuss a method for market segmentationwith choice-basedconjoint models. This method determines the number of market segments, the size of each market segment, and
the values of segment-level conjointpart-worthsusing commonlycollectedconjoint ehoice data. A major advntage of the proposed method is that current (incomplete) data collection approaches for choice-based conjoint
analysis can still be used for market segmentation without having to collect additional data. We illustrate the
proposed method using commercial conjoint choice data gathered in a new concept test for a major consumer
packaged goods company.We also compare the proposed method with an a priori segmentationapproach based
on individual choice frequencies.

1. Introduction
In recent years, choice-based conjoint analysis (Louviere and Woodworth, 1983) has increased in popularity in the marketing research community (Struhl, 1994). Choice-based
conjoint analysis has several advantages. First, data collection involves simulated purchase
decisions (choices), which is a more realistic and relatively simple task for respondents
than are ratings or rankings. Second, the derived part-worth utilities reflect impact on pro&
uct choice rather than a change in rating or ranking. Hence, share estimates are directly
estimated instead of requiring a two-stage process (estimation followed by choice simulation) that requires many assumptions (such as choice rules). Third, product-specific attributes or levels (unique features of a brand, different price levels for each brand) can be
easily accommodated and brand-specific utilities can be estimated. Fourth, in market forecasting applications where more accurate estimates of share and demand are desired, choicebsed conjoint analysis has the ability to embed a no-choice option. Fifth, unlike traditional
conjoint analysis, there is more flexibility in designs encompassing a wide range of choice
contexts such as choosing among alternate product types (asking respondents to choose
among different types of portable communication devices), competing products within the

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WAYNE S. DESARBO, VENKATRAM RAMASWAMY AND STEVEN H. COHEN

same brand (different telephone calling plans), line extensions and product variants (as
illustrated in our empirical application), and so on.
Market segmentation has been a primary objective in performing traditional (ratingsbased) conjoint analysis in commercial applications (Wittink and Cattin, 1989). Green and
Krieger (1991) indicate that apost hoc approach to market segmentation is commonly employed with traditional conjoint analysis wherein estimated individual-level part-worths are
clustered to obtain buyer segments with similar preferences and price sensitivities. In the
case of choice-based conjoint analysis, it is infeasible to obtain individual-level parameter
estimates due to the lack of adequate observations per respondent. Hence, unlike ratings
based conjoint analysis, it is impractical to form market segments post hoc by clustering
individual-level parameter estimates (Elrod, Louviere, and Davey, 1992). The typical current
practice is to conduct aggregate-level estimation (Struhl, 1994). As Struhl (1994, p. 38)
notes: "Aggregate-level analysis means no individual-level utilities of the type obtained
from conjoint. And the absence of individual-level utilities means segmentation is not available . . . . Segmentafion based on conjoint utilities often provides tremendously useful results.
The groups that emerge usually have sharply different wants and needs related to the product in question" While one can still perform a priori segmentafion using ancillary variables
(such as demographics) or based on the observed choice frequencies, there is no guarantee
that the delineated segments will exhibit different preferences and price sensifivities (Green
and Krieger, 1991).
In this paper, we discuss a method for post hoc market segmentation (based on the partworths) with choice-based conjoint data. The proposed method is a generalization of the
Kamakura and Russell (1989) probabilisfic segmentafion approach to an experimental context
entailing choice data gathered over (incomplete) conjoint choice sets. Using this method,
we demonstrate how one can simultaneously perform market segmentation and calibrate
the segment-level part-worths without collecting any additional data. The number of segments, sizes of each segment, and values of segment-level part-worths are all obtained using
only the observed conjoint choice data. Conceptually, the process is similar to DeSarbo,
Wedel, Vriens, and Ramaswamy (1992), who conduct market segmentation and segmentlevel part-worth estimation simultaneously in the context of ratings-based conjoint analysis.
However, their approach cannot be applied to choice-based conjoint analysis, which involves
the collection of choice data over (incomplete) fractionated choice set designs (that is, each
respondent need not see all product or attribute profiles in a fractionated design) and the
specification of a discrete choice model (such as logit model) for parameter estimation.
Given the aforementioned appeal of choice-based conjoint models with practifioners, the
proposed method extends the domain of applicability of these models to accommodate market segmentation applications.

2. Method

Let
i =

j=l,
k=l,

1,

. . , I respondents;
J conjoint profiles and brands;
K conjoint attributes and dummy variables;

MARKET SEGMENTATION WlTH CHOICE-BASED CONJOINT ANALYSIS

139

n = 1. . . . , Nchoice sets (such as from a 2 J design, Louviere and Woodworth, 1983);

Cn = the specific brands in the nth choice set;

Xjk = kth dummy variable for the j t h conjoint profile;
s = 1, . . . , S market segments;
B~s = the impact coefficient for the kth attribute for market segment s;
Yijn = 1 if respondent i chooses brand j in the nth choice set among Cn; 0 otherwise;
In a typical choice-based conjoint experiment, a respondent is asked to choose an alternative from a competitive set of alternatives or choice set, each of which is a profle of
different combination of levels or values of set of multiple attributes. The respondent
repeats this task for a limited number of choice sets thereby providing repeated choice data.
Louviere and Woodworth (1983) discuss different approaches to the design and generation
of these choices sets. These include fixed and 2 ~' choice set designs. In a fixed-choice set
design, the number of alternatives (e.g., brands) in the choice set is fixed over the respondent's task; in other words, there are only changes in orte or more attributes of a fixed
number of alternfives. In a 2 design, the choice set size can vary over the respondent's
task as weil, although a constant base is required (such as a no-choice option or some
reference produc0 for estimation purposes.
Louviere and Woodworth (1983) discuss in detail the implementation of such 2 designs.
Based on our experience, the fixed-choice set design is relatively more popular among
practitioners due to its simplicity. Nevertheless, in the development of our approach, we
assume the more general case of a 2 J design; the fixed-choice set design is a special case
of the 2 J design wherein all alternatives are part of each choice set presented to the respondeut for evaluation. The procedure can also be easily extended to deal with Johnson's (1992)
random-choice set designs.
As discussed in the introduetion, choice-based conjoint models are typically fit at the
aggregate level resulting in a single set of impact coefficients (or paxt-worths) being estimated
for the entire sample of respondents. We propose to operationalize the notion of market
segmentation by assuming the existence of s = 1, . . . , S homogeneous, latent segments
of respondents with similar preference/part-worth structures. We denote the relative sizes
of these segments via the S segment parameters %(0 ___ % _< 1, ~s= 1 oer = 1), which
represent the proportion of respondents belonging to segment s.
Following Kamalmra and Russell (1989), we express a respondent's choice probability
in terms of the choice probabilities of these S segments. Condifional on respondent belonging to segment s, the choice probability is given by

exp

oj~ + ~-~~Xjk3
k=l

P~(jeC) =

,
~ ] exp
ae Cn

(1)

oa~ + xz~_aXak3
k = 1

where 30j~ is the intrinsic utility of brand j to segment s and 3k~ is the impact coefficient
for attribute k in segment s. Hence, while the parameters of the choice-based conjoint model

140

WAYNE S. D E S A R B O , V E N K A T R A M R A M A S W A M Y A N D S T E V E N H. C O H E N

are segment-specific, the composition of the segments are latent and unknown. The unconditional choice probability that a respondent chooses alternative j can be computed as
S

P(jeCn) = E ozsPs(jeC),

(2)

s=l

where ot, the size of segment s, may be construed as the a priori (or initial) probability
of finding a respondent in segment s. Hence, our modeling framework entails a latent mixture of conditional logk models (cf. Kamakura and Russell, 1989; Ramaswamy and DeSarbo,
1990; Gupta and Chintagunta, 1994) to estimate the latent segments using the observed
conjoint choice data. In particular, we modify the Kamakura and Russell (1989) scanner
data response methodology to the choice-based conjoint arena where there are withinsubject replications over (incomplete) choice set presentations. The Kamakura and Russell
(1989) approach may be viewed as a special case of the proposed method when the size
of the choice set (number of alternatives) is fixed over the consecutive choices for a given
individual.

2.1. Model estimation

Given a sample of I respondents, the likelihood of the observed conjoint choice data can
be formulated as

~n
exp
1

Ojs + ~] Xjk~k
k=l

(3)

/-, : H E o~~,I I H
i=l

s=l

n = l j e Cn

~~] exp
aeCn

oa~ + E

Xakt3

k= 1

where Y/inreflects the observed choice of respondent i for brandj in choice set n (Y~yn= 1
if a choice is observed; 0 otherwise). The goal of the estimation is to maximize this likelihood, or equivalently, the In likelihood) with respect to the segment-specific parameters
B = ((B0js, /3ks)) and the S segment proportions A = (as), subject to the constraint that
~sr=l Otr = 1 (see Wedel and DeSarbo, 1994, for a general discussion of latent-mixture
regression models and their estimation).
On obtaining these parameter estimates, we can compute the posterior probability of
membership, Ris, for each respondent i (using Bayes rule) as
N
n = l jeC n

t'is

E as I I I I rA(J1~~
s=l

n = l jeC n

(4)

MARKETSEGMENTATIONWITH CHOICE-BASEDCONJOINTANALYSIS

141

where/3s(j) is the estimated choice probability for alternativej conditional on segment s,

obtained by substituting the respective parameter estimates in expression (1). This feature
accommodates situations where the consumers of a particular market segment display different preference patterns by altowing them to be fractional rnembers of multiple segments.
One could form discrete market segments, if desired, by simply assigning repondent i to
the market segment whose value of Ri~ is highest. Thus, the proposed approach simultaneously estimates the conjoint part-worths and market segment membership with commonly
collected choice-based conjoint data, without any additional data requirements.
Because the number of segments is unknown before analysis, we estimate the proposed
model for varying values of S and use the consistent Akaike information criterion or CAIC
(Bozdogan, 1987) to select a particular solution. The solution that minimizes the value
of CAIC is chosen after ensuring its managerial interpretability. In addition, an entropybased measure, Es, is utilized to examine whether the derived segments are well separated
(see Ramaswamy, DeSarbo, Reibstein, and Robinson, 1993, for a discussion of this measure).

3. Empirical application
To illustrate the proposed method, consider a commercial application of choice-based conjoint analysis conducted for a major packaged goods company as part of a new concept
test. The product category entails frequently purchased food items offered in regular and
diet forms except for local brands, a majority of which rend to be offered only in the regular
form. For reasons of confidentiality, we cannot reveal the specific name of the product
category or the identities of the brands. The product category is dominated by two national
manufacturers, Alpha and Beta. Manufacturer Alpha has two separate product lines with
distinct brand identities (denoted as Alpha 1 and Alpha 2). Under each of these two brand
names, Alpha offered regular and diet versions of the product (denoted as R and D respectively). Hence, the four items offered by Alpha are denoted as Alpha l-R, Alpha l-D, Alpha
2-R, and Alpha 2-D. Manufacturer Beta, the sponsor of the study, has a single brand (Beta 1)
in this product category that was offered in both the regular and diet forms. These are
denoted as Beta 1-R and Beta 1-D respectively. Manufacturer Beta was considering introducing a new version of the diet product that capitalized on a key process technology resulting
in a healthier alternative. Management wished to introduce this new product under a separate
brand name, denoted as Beta N-D. Compared to Alpha, Beta placed relatively more emphasis on the corporate name in its packaging and its advertising, and consumers appareny
had stronger associations between the manufacturer name Beta and its branded products.
To understand consumer tradeoffs between brand and manufacturer name, national and
local brand, regular and diet product form, and price, a conjoint-choice task was designed
using the existing six national brands (Alpha l-R, Alpha l-D, Alpha 2-R, Alpha 2-D, Beta
l-R, Beta 2-D), a local brand alternative (denoted as Local-R), and the new product concept (Beta N-D). These products were all of a standard package size. There were four price
levels tested for each of the two product forms along with a fixed (low) price for the private
label. The average price for the diet product form was $1.44 compared to $1.34 for the
regular product form, reflecting the typical premium pricing for the forrner. The local brand
alternative had a single fixed price of $1.19. In other choice-based conjoint applications,

142

WAYNE S. DESARBO, VENKATRAMRAMASWAMYAND STEVEN H. COHEN

where the competitive set is not quite exhaustive or specific to a product category, this
fixed alternative might represent a "no-choice or other" option. As in all choice-based
conjoint models, there must be at least one constant alternative across choice sets to serve
as the base for estimation purposes because the parameters of the underlying logit choice
model are uniquely determined only up to an additive constant.
Two configurations (incomplete fractional factorials that together formed an orthogonal
array) of sixteen choice sets were generated such that every choice set contained the eight
brands, each at a specific price level. Hence, the choice-set design was fixed over a respondent's choice task. Each of the two incomplete fractional factorials was used with a separate
group of respondents who were screened to ensure that they were category users and qualified for the study. The method of data collection was via personal interviews in several
shopping malls. Respondents were asked to imagine that they were on a shopping trip in
their usual store with intentions to make a purchase in the product category. Each respondent was then shown the sixteen choice sets, each one mimicking a set of brands on the
store shelf. For each choice set, the respondent was asked to pick one brand at the price
shown. In all, the conjoint choice data entail a sample of 600 respondents making a total
of 9,600 choices. The mean price and choice shares for the brands are given in Table 1.
The common practice is to conduct an aggregate analysis of the conjoint-choice data using
a conditional logit model. In such an analysis, all consumers are assumed to have the same
preference structure, and only a single set of "part-worths" is estimated for the entire sample.
This is equivalent to setting S = 1 in the method discussed in the previous section. Alternatively, we can conduct segment-level analyses using the proposed method by varying
the value of S (S > 1). The CAIC heuristic was smallest for the four-segment solution.
The value of the entropy-based measure, Es, was 0.941 for the four-segment solution. This
suggests that the posterior probabilities of membership were very well separated, and the
market may be partitioned into four almost discrete segments (see Ramaswamy et al., 1993).
The aggregate-level and segment-level estimates of the intrinsic brand utilities and price
sensitivities, as well as the segment proportions for the four-segment solution, are given
in Table 2. The log likelihood values for the aggregate analysis and the four-segment solution were -17,391.7 (CAIC =- 34,864.8) and -14,586.3 (CAIC = 29,528.5), respectively.
Three of the four derived segments are relatively large, comprising 24.2 percent, 34.5
percent, and 34.5 percent of the sample. A key insight from Table 2 is that there is a small
segment (6.8 percent) of respondents for whom the new concept is relatively unappealing.
Further, this segment also does not have an intrinsic preference for national brands. ResponTable 1. Mean price and choice share

Brand

Mean Price

Choice Share

Alpha 1-R (Regular)

Alpha 1-D (Diet)
Beta 1-R (Regular)
Beta 1-D (Diet)
Alpha 2-R (Regular)
Alpha 2-D (Diet)
Local-R (Regular)
Beta N-D (New Diet Concept)

$1.34
$1.44
$1.34
$1.44
$1.34
$1.44
$1.19
$1.44

8.1%
9.6
7.7
13.7
7.3
11.9
6.2
35.6

MARKET SEGMENTATIONWITH CHOICE-BASEDCONJOINT ANALYSIS

143

Table 2. Choice-based conjoint estimates: Aggregateversus post hoc segmentation

Segment-Level Analysis

Intrinsic brand utilities (/30j):

Beta N-D
Beta 1-D
Alpha 2-D
Alpha 1-D
Alpha 1-R
Beta 1-R
Alpha 2-R
Local-R
Price sensitivity (/31)
Segment size (as)

Aggregate

Beta
Segment
(24,2%)

Diet
Segment
(34.5%)

Regular
Segment
(34.5%)

Local
Segment
(6.8%)

2.129
1.150
1.003
0.779
0.476
0.426
0.371
0.000
- 1.322

3.791
3.026
-0.191 ns
0.546
- 1.640
1.398
- 1.449
0.000
-0.630

3.468
2.264
2.991
2.582
- 1.093
-0.120 ns
-0.212
0.000
- 1.334

1.733
0.621
0.794
0.752
1.692
1.417
1.529
0.000
- 1.768

-0.936
-2.939
-2.946
-2.196
-2.063
-3.620
-2.145
0.000
-2.831

0.242

0.345

0.345

0.068

Note: All estimates are statistically significant at the 0.01 level, except for those denoted as ns.
dents in this small segment apparently have a high intrinsic utility for local brands and
are extremely price sensitive. We label this small segment as a "local segment." In contrast, respondents in the third segment (34.5 percent) appear to have strong preferences
for regular national brands, and are less price sensitive. This segment is ther~fore labeled
as a "regular segment."
The new concept (Beta N-D) appears to have relatively less appeal in the regular and
local segments. This is consistent with the fact that new concept is a diet product and is
less likely to appeal to regular product buyers. In contrast, Beta N-D appeals more to respondents in the first two segments. These segments however exhibit interesting differences.
The first segment (24.2 percent) appears to consist of respondents who have a high intrinsic
preference for brands Beta N-D, Beta l-D, and to some extent, Beta I-R. This segment
appears to be loyal to Beta, the manufacturer of the new concept. We label this segment
as a "Beta segment." The second segment (34.5 percent) appears to consist of respondents
who exhibit a high intrinsic preference for brands Beta N-D, Beta l-D, Alpha l-D, and
Alpha 2-D, all of which have a diet product form, This segment is therefore labeled as
a "diet segment." Furthermore, the Beta and diet segments exhibit lower price sensitivities
than the regular and local segments. This suggests that consumers in the diet segment are
willing to pay a premium for the benefits offered by the diet product form (lower calories
and rat content), and that consumers in the Beta segment exhibit some loyalty to Manufacturer Beta, possibly due to the perceived higher quality cornmunicated via its corporate
advertising and product packaging.
Despite the presence of a potential new concept bias, we can make a relative comparison
between the aggregate and segment-level results. It is apparent that the new concept appeals
to two groups of consumers: those that are loyal to Beta (the Beta segment) and those that
have a strong preference for diet brands (the diet segment). Further, there appear to be
two groups of buyers of the regular product form: those that have a relatively strong pref-

144

WAYNES. DESARBO,VENKATRAMRAMASWAMYAND STEVENH. COHEN

erence for national brands (regular segment) and those that prefer local brand alternatives
(local segment). The new diet concept does not seem to appeal to buyers of the regular
product form. Finally, the Beta segment appears to be the least price sensitive. This segment's buyers seem to recognize the quality image and corporate identity created by Manufacturer Beta through its advertising and packaging. A summary of the market segmentation
can be obtained by using expression (1) and mean brand prices to transform the withinsegment parameter estimates in Table 2 into mean condifional brand choice probabilifies
for each segment. These are shown in Table 3. (Within-segment choice probabilities larger
than aggregate choice probabilities are boxed.)
Besides the new product concept, it is evident that brands of the diet form (Beta l-D,
Alpha 2-D, Alpha l-D) have relatively large shares in the diet segment, with Beta 1-D exhibiting a stronger presence within the Beta segment. Further, brands of the regular form
(Alpha I-R, Beta l-R, alpha 2-R) have relatively large shares in the regular segment, while
the local brand has a dominant position in the local segment. It is also evident from the
above table that the new concept has a much larger share in the Beta and diet segments.
Overall, the market seems to be structured according to a combination of brand and manufacturer name, product form (regular versus diet), and type of brand (national versus local).
In the present study, some ancillary data such as respondents' evaluation of the new concept, past purchase behavior (category and brand specific quesfions), attitudes toward health,
fitness, diet, and nntrition, and background characteristics such as demographics were collected from respondents as part of the concept tesfing process. In general, by profiling the
derived segments using such descriptive data, further insights into their composition can
be obtained. In situafions where the segment memberships exhibit some fuzziness, the posterior membership probabilities can be directly analyzed as a function of relevant descriptor
variables (see Ramaswamy, DeSarbo, Reibstein, and Robinson, 1993, for an illustrative
analysis of fuzzy posterior probabilifies, albeit in a different modeling context). In the present context, given the high separation of the derived segments, discrete partitions of the
sample were formed by assigning each respondent to the segment with the highest posterior
Table 3. Brand choiceprobabilities for each segment

Beta Segment
(24.2%)

Diet Segment
(34.5%)

Regular Segment
(34.5%)

Local Segment
(6.8%)

Beta N-D

0.60

0.41

0.19

0.13

Beta 1-D

0.28

0.14

0.06

0.02

Alpha 2-D

0.01

0.25

0.08

0,02

Alpha 1-D

0.02

0.17

0.07

0.02

Alpha 1-R

0.00

0.00

0.21

0.06

Beta 1-R

0.06

0.01

0.16

0.01

Alpha 2-R

0.00

0.01

0.18

0.05

Local-R

0.02

0.02

0.04

0.69

MARKET SEGMENTATIONWITH CHOICE-BASEDCONJOINT ANALYSIS

145

probability. The segment proportions after modal allocations of the respondents are 0.242,
0.348, 0.343, and 0.067, which are almost identical to the estimated segment sizes. These
discrete segments were then profiled using the ancillary data.
As might be expected, the Beta and diet segments exhibited higher top-two box scores
for purchase intent and uniqueness of the new concept. Further, the Beta segment had a
high incidence of purchase of Beta's products, which is again consistent with this segment's
high intrinsic utility for these products. In contrast, the regular and local segments were
indeed less favorable toward the new product concept, with the local segment having a
very low incidence of purchase of Beta's products. Respondents belonging to the Beta and
diet segments also appeared to have a strong orientation toward health and fitness and a
basic commitment to watching their intake of calories and fat. This was in direct contrast
to respondents in the regular and local segments, who appeared to be less concerned about
such issues, with the latter segment having even lower concern. However, there was only
a weak distinction between the segments with respect to demographics. The regular segment had reltively lower income respondents from somewhat larger households, while the
local segment appeared to consist of "empty nesters" with larger-than-average incomes.
Overall, the segments had distinct evaluations of the new concept, attitudes toward fitness
and nutrition, preferences for the new concept, and past category and brand purchase behavior that appeared to be consistent with the derived segmentation scheme, thereby lending
some face validity to the results. Given the nature of the product, it was not surprising
to find only weak differences in demographics. In general, background characteristics such
as demographics have been found to be weakly associated with attribute preferences (Gupta
and Chintagunta, 1994; Moore, 1980), and other background data such as perceived importance and appropriateness-in-use of various usage situations may provide better insights
for food-related products. However, a priori, it may not be obvious which set ofbackground
variables should form the basis of the segments to enable disaggregate estimation of choicebased conjoint models. While it may be difficult to use background variables to form segments a priori, another option is to cluster respondents based on the observed-choice
frequencies.

3.1. A priori segmentation based on observed-choice frequencies

We used a K-means cluster analysis of the observed-choice frequencies to form four segments. After splitting the sample into these four apriori segments, we estimated a separate
choice-based conjoint model for ech segment. The parameter estimates for each a priori
segment (as weil as the aggregate-level estimates) are shown in Table 4. There are three
key observations from Table 4. First, the price sensitivity does not vary across the four
a priori segments. Second, within each segment, the diet brands have larger intrinsic brand
utilities than the regular brands; this ordering is similar to the aggregate case. Third, the
four segment sizes from the K-means cluster analysis are about equal. Overall, the a priori
segment-level results do not exhibit any striking variation across the segments and are similar to the aggregate-level estimates. What about the choice shares within each segment?
While one would expect variation in the observed within-segment shares (given that the
cluster analysis was based on the observed individual choice frequencies), we found hardly

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WAYNE S. DESARBO, VENKATRAM RAMASWAMY AND STEVEN H. COHEN

Table 4. Choice-based conjoint estimates: Aggregate versus a priori segmentation

Segment-Level Analysis

Intrinsic brand utilities (/30j):

Beta N-D
Beta 1-D
Alpha 2-D
Alpha 1-D
Alpha 1-R
Beta 1-R
Alpha 2-R
Local-R
Price sensitivity (/30

Aggregate

Segment 1
(21.2%)

Segment 2
(25.8%)

Segment 3
(25.7%)

Segment 4
(27.3%)

2.129
1.150
1.003
0.779
0.476
0.426
0.371
0.000
- 1.322

1.760
1.056
0.346
0.360
-0.453
-0.254
-0.138
0.000
- 1.090

1.874
1.102
0.433
0.465
0.035
-0.042
0.206
0.000
- 1.144

2.035
1.290
0.613
0.649
0.227
0.158
0.395
0.000
- 1.156

1.718
1.093
0.366
0.410
-0.058
-0.097
0.091
0.000
- 1.123

any variation in the estimated segment-level conditional choice probabilities. Since the cluster
analysis and the within-segment choice-based conjoint analysis do not maximize the same
objectivefunction in the a priori case, there is no assurance that the a priori segments will
exhibit different intrinsic brand utilities and price sensitivities. Clustering the choice frequencies results in a priori segments with less variation in brand choices and increases the
chances of obtaining insignificant parameter esitmates. In fact, the log likelihood based
on the a priori segmentation results was - 17,474.7, which is no bettet than the aggregate
case. The congruence between the a priori classification of respondents and the post hoc
discrete segment allocation (after appropriate permutation) is only 57 percent. Further, as
noted by DeSarbo, Wedel, Vriens, and Ramaswamy (1992), different clustering procedures
can potentially lead to different a priori segmentation schemes and consequeny, different
segment-level results.
The fundamental goal of market segmentation with conjoint analysis is to capture market
heterogeneity in brand and attribute preferences and price sensitivity. In traditional ratingsbased conjoint analysis, this is afforded through the potential of conducting individuallevel estimation and then clustering the resultant individual-level part-worths to form segments. In a choice-based conjoint setting, it is inefficient to estimate individual-level parameters with a limited number of choices. The proposed approach is an attraetive option for
carrying out market segmentation with choice-based conjoint analysis.

4. Conclusion
We have discussed an approch for market segmentation with choice-based conjoint analysis.
The inability to derive market segments has heretofore been a primary disadvantage of
choice-based conjoint analysis (Struhl, 1994). We overcome this disadvantage by accommodating consumer heterogeneity via multiple segments of consumers possessing different
utility structures. A major benefit of the proposed method is that the segments are derived
empirically using commonly collected conjoint-choice data without recourse to any a priori
specification of the nature of the heterogeneity (typically based on ancillary backgronnd

MARKET SEGMENTATION W1TH CHOICE-BASED CONJOINT ANALYSIS

147

data). The number of segments, their sizes and utility structures are all derived empirically, in a maximum-likelihood framework.
We demonstrated the proposed method using commercial conjoint-choice data gathered
in a new concept test. Out approach, however, is not restricted to this type of application
and can be used in other settings involving different designs. In general, our approach is
applicable in any instance where conjoint-choice data have been gathered, although, as
discussed, researchers may be currently analyzing the data in the aggregate or at the level
of a priori segments. Clearly, further testing of the approach is necessary to establish its
usefulness to practitioners. Since no validation profiles were collected in the commercial
application, we could not perform holdout analyses to compare share predictions based
on our approach versus an aggregate-level approach. There is some empirical evidence
from the choice modeling literature that models which capture heterogeneity, particularly
via multiple market segments, perform better than aggregate-level models in terms of predicting both aggregate and individual-level choice shares (Ramaswamy and DeSarbo, 1990).
It would be fruitful to perform a cross-validation assessment of our approach and other
alternatives to market segmentation (different a priori specifications of heterogeneity), similar in spirit to Green and Helsen (1989) who compare alternatives to individual-level ratingsbased conjoint models.
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