DeSarbo, W. S., Atalay, A. S., LeBaron, D., & Blanchard, S. J. (2008). Estimating multiple consumer segment ideal points from context-dependent survey data. Journal of Consumer Research, 35(1), 142-153.
Previous research in marketing and consumer research has shown that consumers/households often possess multiple ideal points in a given product/service category. In such cases, traditional segmentation and positioning models that estimate a single ideal point per individual/segment may render an inaccurate portrayal of the true underlying utility functions of such consumers/segments and the resulting market structure. We propose a new clusterwise multiple-ideal-point spatial methodology that estimates multiple ideal points at the market segment level while simultaneously determining the market segments' composition of consumers, as well as the corresponding joint space.