Commentary

Help! I'm Drowning (In Data)!

Chris Pyne, Chief Strategy Officer at MediaCom US, loves data. Like many brand marketers, however, Pyne says there’s always the risk of drowning in the stuff.

The real problem is that marketers don’t know what sort of data they’re looking for, according to Andrew Edwards, CEO of Technology Leaders, a Web and multichannel analytics firm.

The difficultly is getting customers to speak up and articulate exactly what sort of findings they’re after, said Edwards. You’ll hear far too few marketers say “This is the stuff I really want to know about,” he said. Marketers “often need a lot more guidance than you’d think.”

Added Edwards: “There’s always a conversation [with clients] because they typically start off with some rather vague ideas” about what they're trying to achieve with their measurement investment.

And even if marketers (with some third-party help) can narrow down available data, that doesn't mean they know how to act on it. For that reason, Lauren Moores, SVP of Data & Research at Compete says she doesn’t like to give marketers direct data feeds.

All the same, Pyne at MediaCom says the effectiveness of measurement and analytics has improved dramatically. At one time, Pyne said he could achieve 5-10% improvements in campaign effectiveness, whereas today he can achieve around 50% improvements.

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