The Faces of Success: Beauty and Ugliness Premiums in Online Platforms

Previous studies of beauty demonstrate many positive biases directed toward attractive people. In contrast, our research of online profile pictures suggests both a beauty and ugliness premium in e-commerce platforms. Using large datasets of profile pictures from two different platforms, we examine the effect of facial attractiveness of online sellers on product sales and find that both very attractive and very unattractive people sell significantly more than the average-looking ones. We conduct an online experiment to explore the underlying mechanism and find that attractive faces lead to greater credibility due to their perceived social competence while unattractive ones are considered more believable based on their intellectual competence. These findings highlight the informational value and influence of facial appearance in online platforms and have significant implications for e-commerce and marketing strategies.