IMPROVING DECISION-MAKING BY MEANS OF A MARKETING DECISION-SUPPORT SYSTEM

Marketing decision makers are confronted with an increasing amount of information. This leads to a complex decision environment that may cau se decision makers to lapse into using mental-effort-reducing heuristi cs such as anchoring and adjustment, in an experimental study, we find that the use of a marketing decision support system (MDSS) increases the effectiveness of marketing decision makers. An MDSS is effective b ecause it assists its users in identifying the important decision vari ables and, subsequently, making better decisions based on those variab les. Decision makers using an MDSS are also less susceptible to applyi ng the anchoring and adjustment heuristic and, therefore show more var iation in their decisions in a dynamic environment. Low-analytical dec ision makers and decision makers operating under low time pressure esp ecially benefit from using an MDSS.