2009-10 INFORMS Society for Marketing Science MSI Practice Prize

The 2009-10 INFORMS Society for Marketing Science Practice Prize was awarded to Marc Fischer, University of Passau, and Sönke Albers, Christian-Albrechts-University at Kiel, for “Dynamic Marketing Budget Allocation across Countries, Products, and Marketing Activities.”

The prize—awarded for an outstanding implementation of marketing science concepts and methods—was presented at the Marketing Science Conference on January 15, 2010, hosted by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The conference was chaired by V. Kumar, Richard and Susan Lenny Distinguished Chair Professor in Marketing, Georgia State University.

The Practice Prize Committee was chaired by past MSI Executive Director Russell Winer, William Joyce Professor of Marketing, New York University, and included 2009-11 MSI Executive Director Ruth N. Bolton.

The winning research provides an innovative solution to the dynamic marketing allocation budget problem for multi-product, multi-country firms. A decision support model allows the firm to determine annual marketing budgets at the country-product-activity level in an Excel-supported environment. The model takes into account marketing dynamics and a product’s growth potential as well as tradeoffs with respect to marketing effectiveness and profit contribution

The other finalists in the competition were:

• John Roberts, Australian National University and London Business School, Ken Roberts and Alan Simpson, both of Forethought Research, and Peter Danaher, Melbourne Business School, for “Jetstar: Driving the Brand”
• Joep Arts, VU University Amsterdam, Koen Pauwels, Ozyegin University and Dartmouth College, and Thorsten Wiesel, University of Groningen, for “Marketing’s Profit Impact: Quantifying Online and Offline Funnel Progression”
• V. Kumar and Denish Shah, both of Georgia State University, and Jac Herschler, Prudential, for “Uncovering Implicit Customer Needs for Determining Explicit Product Positioning: Growing Prudential Annuities’ Variable Annuity Sales”

As with previous competitions, presentations of the entries will be made available in DVD version for educational purposes, including executive education. DVD adopters also will have access to related material for classroom use. This material, along with the material from previous competitions (available now), will be available at http://www3.informs.org/site/ISMS_DVD/index.php?c=35&kat=ISMS+DVDs&p=6%7C.

In addition, papers and reports on these outstanding implementations of marketing science will appear in a forthcoming issue of Marketing Science.