Selecting appropriate support for marketing decisions

Though several forms of support systems for marketing decisions have been reported in the literature, the field of marketing decision support systems (MDSS) has not yet been formalized to the extent that appropriate computer-based support can be provided for the spectrum of decisions faced by today’s marketing managers. Given the wide variety of marketing decisions, it becomes imperative that a systematic approach to the selection of support mechanism for diverse decision types be employed for effective decision making. This paper proposes a framework based on the structure of decisions and nature of decision input that permits classification of marketing decisions and outlines normative support mechanisms for each decision type. This approach offers savings for operational managers and senior executives through reduction in exploratory analysis effort, improved quality of decisions, and more effective allocation of resources for MDSS development.