Decision making

Decision-making can be defined as the process of selecting a right and effective course of action from
two or more alternatives for the purpose of achieving a desired result. Decision-making is the essence of
management.

Individual decision
Individual decision refers to the decision making process where an individual selects the
course of action to be followed in the business from various alternatives.
Consumers as problem solvers

• A consumer purchase
may be a response to a
perceived problem.
• They realize that they
want to make a
purchase and go
through a series of steps
to do so.
Stages in consumer-decision making
 Problem recognition
The first step of the consumer decision-making process is recognizing the need for a service or
product. The need may have been triggered by internal stimuli (such as hunger or thirst) or
external stimuli (such as advertising or word of mouth).
Need recognition, whether prompted internally or externally, results in the same response: a
want. Once consumers recognize a want, they need to gather information to understand how
they can fulfill that want, which leads to step two.