Thursday, August 13th, 2009
In the last 10 days or so, I’ve come to learn a few things about data.
1) Data tells stories
It tells you what people are interested in, what people are talking about, and that can sometimes be a polar opposite from what your brand would like them to talk about. Dorothy, who works at a similarly data-driven company, Brandtology, tells the tale of brand mentions and searches telling the financial sector that they should sit up and pay attention. Everything is data, data, data. If you’re not plugged in, you’re losing out.
2) Data is imperfect
Dorothy and I have said this before on The GennY Podcast. As much as existing web analytics does not report statistics in the depth that people are (unreasonably) demanding, it’s still miles galaxies ahead of “faith based initiatives” as Avinash puts it:
How do you measure the effectiveness of your magazine ad? Now compare that to the data you have from doubleclick. How about measuring the ability of your TV ad to reach the right audience? Compare that with measuring reach through Paid Search (or Affiliate Marketing or …..). Do you think you get better data from Neilsen’s TV panel of between 15k – 30k US residents to represent the diversity of TV content consumption of 200 million tv watching Americans?
There is simply no comparison. So why waste our life trying to get perfect data from our web sites and online marketing campaigns? Why does unsound, incomplete, and faith based data from TV, Magazines, Radio get a pass? Why be so harsh to your web channel? Just because you can collect data here means you won’t do anything because it is imperfect?
Lesson? Give me half-sound data over guesswork any day.
3) Data Surprises
One of the data related posts I read early on came from Avinash, telling us how gun websites and car rental sites can be platforms for targeting older men who have performed searches on Paris Hilton and Kim Kardashian. I took a long time reconciling that fact. And maybe at some level I still haven’t. It’s going to be one of those things I need to do, test and see the results to believe. But I do believe data doesn’t lie – but it will surprise.
Does data have a place right now?
Frankly, I’m of the personal opinion that a data-driven, results/strategy-focused mentality has yet to be the norm in organisations. It’s not always going to be this way. Sooner rather than later, people are going to tire of experimenting with the “shiny new object” and wonder just how much traction their Facebook, blog, email, search, Twitter efforts are getting for them, which they need to invest more money in and which need to go.
And the only thing that will deliver those results, is data.
Tags: affiliate marketing, avinash kaushik, blog, brand mentions, brandtology, data, data tells stories, data trends, data-driven, dorothypoon, email, facebook, faith based initiatives, genny podcast, nielsen, paid search, results focused, ROI, Search, SEO, strategy focused, tv ad, twitter, web analytics
Posted in Marketing, social media, social media business | 6 Comments »
Monday, May 18th, 2009
This is a quick overview of Day One of Youth Connect! which I had the privilege of attending and being a panelist at today, and I had a really good time.
For the first time in a long time, I could listen to people who actually knew their stuff go up there and tell us about their social media efforts, demonstrate some form of ROI, and hold up under scrutiny. I admit I was all ready to roll my eyes in cynicism when a speaker went up and said he was well-versed in digital marketing with an advertising agency, but then he actually knew what he was talking about. Very different from some speakers who just talk a lot, but don’t really say anything.
So my highlight was really speaking at the youth panel with four other people from the other universities, and I have to give Graham Perkins (@grayperks)props for really revving up the crowd even though it was the last session of the day. It was by far the most interactive session I’ve had the chance to speak at, and I think the smaller size of the conference helped people get used to one another and ask questions.
One thing that I “feel” intuitively at this conference, is that people understand more about social media than they did a year ago. The types of questions I had to answer a year ago and the types of questions I had to answer today, were quite different, and basic knowledge of what Facebook is, what Twitter is, what iPhones can do, can be pretty much be assumed, which makes a lot of difference when you’re trying to answer questions without leaving anyone behind.
As always, my favourite topic of newspapers came up again (which I will blog about soon), and I did have to answer one question about the effectiveness of advertising, and whether youth actually notice them. The room gave a slightly audible gasp when I told them Gen Y is pretty much trained to “ignore” interruptive marketing and advertising, but I think it’s not an exaggeration to say that.
When one other attendee asked if anyone of the five of us saw a physical ad (print, tv, outdoor) and went online to do research on that product or service based on the ad, the answer was a resounding no. So there you have it.
Lots of other stuff I want to talk about, a few great case studies that I really enjoyed listening to, I hope to blog them soon. It’s going to be Youth Connect! Week on the blog this week, but I think you’ll enjoy reading about it.
I will say this about the organisers: It’s not a big event, but I think they brought in great speakers. Companies who paid money to attend this (especially in this recession), should be very satisfied with the value they got out of it.
Tags: advertising, day one, digital marketing, facebook, Gen Y, graham perkins, ignore interruptive marketing, interruptive advertising, iphone, newspapers, outdoor ad, panelist, physical ad, print ad, ROI, social media efforts, tv ad, twitter, youth connect, youth panelist
Posted in Events, Singapore, social media, social media business | 2 Comments »
