What Are Decision Support System, Databases And Data Warehousing?
A marketing decision support system (DSS) is a computer-based system that helps decision makers confront problems through direct interaction with databases and analytical software programs.
The purpose of DSS is to store data and transform them into organized information that is easily accessible to the marketing managers. Doing so saves managers countless hours so that decisions that might take days or even weeks otherwise can be made in minutes using a DSS.
Modern DSS greatly facilitate customer relationship management (CRM). A CRM system is the part of the DSS that addresses exchanges between the firm and its customers. It brings together information about the customers, including sales data, market trends, marketing promotions and the way consumers respond to them, customer preferences, and more. A CRM system describes customer relationships in sufficient detail so that managers, salespeople, customer service representatives, and perhaps the customers themselves can access information directly, match customer needs with satisfying product offerings, remind customers of service requirements, and to know what other products a customer has purchased.
Casinos track regular customers’ behavior via “player’s cards” that are swiped each time a consumer conducts a transaction. This information is fed automatically into a CRM system that creates tailor-made promotional packages. The promotion may be unique to a specific customer’s preferences as tracked by their own pattern of behavior. You may notice when visiting certain websites that they seem to be able to predict your behavior.
Raw, unsummarized data are input to the decision support system. Data collected in marketing research projects are a major source of this input, but the data may be purchased or collected by accountants, sales managers, production managers, or company employees other than marketing researchers. Effective marketers spend a great deal of time and effort collecting information for input into the decision support system. Useful information is the output of a decision support system. A decision support system requires both databases and software. For firms operating across national borders, the decision support system becomes part of its global information system.
DATABASE
A database is a collection of raw data arranged logically and organized in a form that can be stored and processed by a computer. A customer mailing list is one type of database. Population characteristics may be recorded by state, country, and city in another database. Modern computer technology makes both the storage and the retrieval of this information easy and convenient. The population data needed to do a retail site analysis may have meant days, possibly weeks, in a library. Today, the information is just a few clicks away.
DATA WAREHOUSING
Data warehousing is the process allowing important day-to-day operational data to be stored and organized for simplified access. More specifically, a data warehouse is the multitiered computer storehouse of current and historical data. Data warehouse management requires that the detailed data from operational systems be extracted, transformed, placed into logical partitions and stored in a consistent manner. Organizations with data warehouses may integrate databases from both inside and outside the company. Managing a data warehouse effectively requires considerable computing power and expertise. As a result, data warehouse companies exist that provide this service for companies in return for a fee.
