ABSTRACT
We ask whether non-persuasive puffery can affect purchase decisions. This question is motivated by legal strategies that are used by marketers accused of false advertising and rely on a presumption that consumers dismiss puffery as sales bluster. But if consumers dismiss puffery, then why is it such a staple of marketing communication? In contrast to prior research on the persuasive role of puffery, we treat puffery as the portion of the marketer’s message that is pure noise. A buyer seeks match value realizations from a seller’s offering and an outside option. Puffery is effective if and only if the buyer has limited attention and has an ex-ante preference toward the seller’s product. By using puffery, the seller discourages the buyer from learning realizations that would otherwise sway her away from the seller’s product. This result undermines the ‘puffery doctrine’ used to defend allegations of false advertising in court.
Bao, Weining and Dukes, Anthony J and Xiao, Ping, Puffery as Occlusion: A Story of Rational Inattention (January 16, 2026).
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