A choquet integral toolbox and its application in customer preference analysis

Customer preferences have always been of interest to researchers aiming to support the strategic planning and decision making of business managers. An effective way of analyzing the preferences is to model the multicriteria decision making (MCDM) of the customers. However, it requires the simultaneous consideration of multiple criteria, which is insufficient for many traditional methods. In this chapter, we deploy an aggregation function technique, the Choquet Integral, and introduce a newly developed toolbox, named Rfmtool, for preference analysis. Focusing on a case study of the Singapore hotel industry, we demonstrate how this toolbox can be used to discover the preferences that affect the hotel selections of travelers. The introduced technique and developed toolbox are expected to benefit researchers and managers worldwide in performing more effective business management. © 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.