Berend Wierenga

Publishers of Foundations and Trends, making research accessible

Publishers of Foundations and Trends, making research accessible

How do you respond when receiving advice from somebody with the argumentation “my gut tells me so” or “this is what my intuition says”? Most likely, you would find this justification insufficient and disregard the advice. Are there also situations where people do appreciate such intuitive advice and change their opinion accordingly? A growing number of authors write about the power of intuition in solving problems, showing that intuitively made decisions can be of higher quality than decisions based on analytical reasoning. We want to know if decision makers, when receiving advice based on an intuitive cognitive process, also recognize the value of such advice. Is advice justified by intuition necessarily followed to a lesser extent than an advice justified by analysis? Furthermore, what are the important factors influencing the effect of intuitive justification on advice taking? Participants across three studies show that utilization of intuitive advice varies depending on advisor seniority and type of task for which the advice is given. Summarizing, the results suggest that decision makers a priori doubt the value of intuitive advice and only assess it as accurate if other cues in the advice setting corroborate this. Intuitively justified advice is utilized more if it comes from a senior advisor. In decision tasks with experiential products, intuitively justified advice can even have more impact than analytically justified advice. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

In a viral marketing campaign organizations stimulate customers to forward marketing messages to their contacts. To optimize a viral campaign it is necessary to predict how many customers will be reached, how this reach evolves, and how it depends on promotion activities. a new Viral Branching model can provide these results. It is based on insights from epidemiology and the spread of viruses and was adapted to a marketing context and an electronic environment. The model is applied to an actual viral marketing campaign in which over 200,000 customers participated during a six-week period. The results show that the model quickly predicts the actual reach of the campaign and serves as a valuable tool to support marketing decisions related to online campaigns

Marketing management support systems (MMSS) are computer-enabled devices that help marketers to make better decisions. Marketing processes can be quite complex, involving large numbers of variables and mostly outcomes are the results of the actions of many different stakeholders (e.g., the company itself, its customers, its competitors). Moreover, a large number of interdependencies exist between the relevant variables and the outcomes of marketing actions are subject to major uncertainties. Given the complexities of the market place, marketing management support systems are useful tools to help the marketing decision makers carry out their jobs. Marketing management support systems can only be effective when they are optimally geared toward their users. We, therefore, deal with decision making in marketing (which generates the need for marketing management support systems). We discuss how marketing decisions are made, how they should be made, and the relative roles of analytical versus intuitive cognitive processes in marketing decision making. We also discuss the match between marketing problem-solving modes and the various types of marketing management support systems. Finally we discuss how the impact of MMSS can be improved. This is important, given the current under-utilization of MMSS in practice. We discuss the conditions for the successful implementation and effective use of marketing management support systems. The issue ends with a discussion of the opportunities and challenges for marketing management support systems as we foresee them.