Premium
ALLOCATE: A COMPUTER MODEL FOR SALES TERRITORY PLANNING
Author(s) -
Comer James M.
Publication year - 1974
Publication title -
decision sciences
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.238
H-Index - 108
eISSN - 1540-5915
pISSN - 0011-7315
DOI - 10.1111/j.1540-5915.1974.tb00619.x
Subject(s) - operations research , computer science , schedule , revenue , revenue management , apportionment , sales management , sales and operations planning , operations management , marketing , business , economics , finance , engineering , artificial intelligence , law , political science , perspective (graphical) , operating system
Recent years have witnessed a renewal of interest in the application of management science techniques to personal selling related problems. Some early applications are described in [2] [7]. Cloonan has employed simulation in examination of the salesman routing problem [3] [4]. Lodish, in CALLPLAN, has devised an interactive call planning system designed to assist sales management and/or salesmen in allocating sales call time more efficiently [6]. Armstrong has devised a system he labels SCHEDULE which estimates the value of calls on accounts [1]. Hess and Samuels have designed a computer based sales districting model which is an analogue of a legislative apportionment model [5]. The objective of this paper is to explore the nature of a call planning system entitled ALLOCATE. ALLOCATE was designed to be employed by upper sales management either as an input device for sales management decisions such as sales‐territory‐size, or as a vehicle for determining the effects of alternative call allocation strategies on territorial revenue over multiple time periods.