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Artificial intelligence (AI) in strategic marketing decision-making: a research agenda

Merlin Stone (Department of Business, Law and Society, St Mary’s University, Twickenham, London and Portsmouth Business School, University of Portsmouth, Portsmouth, UK)
Eleni Aravopoulou (Department of Business, Law and Society, St Mary’s University, Twickenham, London)
Yuksel Ekinci (Portsmouth Business School, University of Portsmouth, Portsmouth, UK)
Geraint Evans (St Mary’s University, Twickenham, London, UK)
Matt Hobbs (Accenture, London, UK)
Ashraf Labib (Portsmouth Business School, University of Portsmouth, Portsmouth, UK)
Paul Laughlin (Laughlin Consultancy, Newport, UK)
Jon Machtynger (University of Surrey, Guildford, UK and Microsoft, London, UK)
Liz Machtynger (Essential, London, UK)

The Bottom Line

ISSN: 0888-045X

Article publication date: 21 April 2020

Issue publication date: 18 May 2020

11168

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to review literature about the applications of artificial intelligence (AI) in strategic situations and identify the research that is needed in the area of applying AI to strategic marketing decisions.

Design/methodology/approach

The approach was to carry out a literature review and to consult with marketing experts who were invited to contribute to the paper.

Findings

There is little research into applying AI to strategic marketing decision-making. This research is needed, as the frontier of AI application to decision-making is moving in many management areas from operational to strategic. Given the competitive nature of such decisions and the insights from applying AI to defence and similar areas, it is time to focus on applying AI to strategic marketing decisions.

Research limitations/implications

The application of AI to strategic marketing decision-making is known to be taking place, but as it is commercially sensitive, data is not available to the authors.

Practical implications

There are strong implications for all businesses, particularly large businesses in competitive industries, where failure to deploy AI in the face of competition from firms, who have deployed AI to improve their decision-making could be dangerous.

Social implications

The public sector is a very important marketing decision maker. Although in most cases it does not operate competitively, it must make decisions about making different services available to different citizens and identify the risks of not providing services to certain citizens; so, this paper is relevant to the public sector.

Originality/value

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is one of the first papers to probe deployment of AI in strategic marketing decision-making.

Keywords

Citation

Stone, M., Aravopoulou, E., Ekinci, Y., Evans, G., Hobbs, M., Labib, A., Laughlin, P., Machtynger, J. and Machtynger, L. (2020), "Artificial intelligence (AI) in strategic marketing decision-making: a research agenda", The Bottom Line, Vol. 33 No. 2, pp. 183-200. https://doi.org/10.1108/BL-03-2020-0022

Publisher

:

Emerald Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2020, Emerald Publishing Limited

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