Information sources used by an organization during a complex decision process - An exploratory study

Understanding how organizations behave when they are confronted with a complex purchase is of great interest to companies providing such complex offerings. In this study, the behavior of organizations in search of information has been evaluated. The analysis of the search for information is based on a mail survey of 75 firms that recently invested abroad from a principal components analysis, we identified five sets of information sources of which personal and internal sources are the most important. On the contrary, both commercial and noncommercial impersonal sources are by far the least important. The source ''external consultant'' has been identified as one key source used during a complex decision process incorporating a high level of uncertainty. The results suggest that a mix of communication tools should be used by marketers when promoting their offering. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science Inc.