Monthly Archives: August 2012

August 7, 2012 · 10:43 am

Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For

U2 provides the succinct summary this morning of some research published by the folks at Lynchpin and Econsultancy.

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Those two concerns examined how companies are using and learning from analytics and their Online Measurement and Strategy Report brings us back to a theme we’ve explored previously here on the screed.  In brief, companies are finding out more and learning less.  What I mean, and what the report shows, is that companies have more data than ever about consumer behavior and yet because of a number of factors they find the data less useful and without context.

Here are a few findings:

A majority of marketers worldwide say that less than half of all the analytics data they collect is actually useful for decision-making. Just one in 10 companies thought a strong majority of analytics data was helpful, and less than a third said somewhere between half and three-quarters of all data was useful.

While finding the right staff has been also highlighted as a limiting factor in the report, one other issue that emerges after looking into the responses is that organizational issues are another common frustration.  These demonstrate themselves in ways such as :

There is one team in charge of web analytics – not a marketing team – so for the marketing colleagues it is a fight to try to extract data from the analytics team.

Huge and siloed organisations, complexity of aged infrastructure and sites, legal policies

Getting management agreement on goals.

Education of senior management in understanding the benefit of an integrated digital performance management process.

Once again we find that a lot of data isn’t necessarily a lot of information.  For that to appear we need to formulate actionable business questions that are concerns of as many stakeholders as we can involve and then seek out the appropriate data to answer them.  The more we know the less we understand, apparently, and many businesses still haven’t found what they’re looking for despite drowning in data.   I think that’s kind of amazing and a bit sad.  What do you think?

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August 6, 2012 · 8:48 am

What I Learned By Getting Whupped

Yesterday was the final round of my golf club’s championship. I made it all the way to the final match during which I was beaten like a rented mule. I did announce that it was my birthday before we teed off but my opponent’s good wishes ended as soon as we hit the first shots.  I suppose it would be pretty understandable if I was upset, but I’m not. I’ve never made it this far in the competition and the loss wasn’t so much about my playing badly as it was about his playing well. Which is, of course, a business point.

These are a few of the things I learned both prior to and during the butt-kicking:

  • You can have butterflies as long as you can get them to fly in formation.  It’s amazing how much raw energy one can get from being nervous.  You might get it speaking publicly; I got it on the first tee.  My thing was to focus on it  and then to dismiss it.  Noting what’s going on isn’t the same as getting caught up in it.
  • Breaking large tasks down into small pieces really does work.  Thinking about having to win a lot of holes of golf to get to the final was kind of daunting.  Making one good swing to get to the next shot was relatively easy.  Getting revenues to double by the end of the fiscal year is hard; closing one more deal this week seems do-able.
  • Getting beaten isn’t the same as losing.  Avis made a pretty good business being number 2.  Very few categories only can support a single player.
  • Finally, I learned not to compound my mistakes.  It’s hard to hit out of deep rough 200 yards to the green and it’s a much better idea to take one’s medicine, pitch out, and try to knock it close from back in the fairway.  We often make mistakes in business but if we don’t compound them we might just make a surprise par and win the hole.

I realize playing for a club championship isn’t the PGA Tour but it was fun to get a taste of high-level competition.  Like business, it’s far more taxing mentally than it is physically, an ultimately the ability to focus mentally helps overcome the physical challenges.  Fore!

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August 3, 2012 · 8:43 am

Avocados And Your Business

Foodie Friday is here and today’s topic is an ad I came across while reading one of my favorite food magazines. I own many knives and I’m not opposed to buying more of them. Yes, I realize I only have two hands and it’s generally a bad idea to use more than one knife at a time, so another knife is not a priority. Still, I appreciate that each of the knives I own is of a particular sort and it’s generally a good idea to use a tool appropriate to the task. While a good chef’s knifecan handle almost anything (and our kitchen is equipped with them in several sizes), having a boning knife makes that task easier, just as a good slicing knife or a bread knife can cut meat or bread, respectively, better than can a general purpose blade.

That said, I laughed out loud when I saw an ad for an avocado knife. Seriously. A knife dedicated to cutting, pitting, and scooping avocados.  Of course, I saw a business point immediately.

This is a solution in search of a problem.  I’ve cut hundreds of avocados.  I generally use my smaller chef’s knife to remove the seed and a spoon to scoop out the flesh.  I’ve never had a problem or wished I had a better tool with which to do the job, unlike seeding a mango, for example.  We don’t just come across this mistake in the kitchen.  I’ve spoken with quite a few businesses who have thought that what they were developing was something really important but for which there wasn’t a need.  Or demand.  Or a market.

Obviously consumers aren’t always aware that they have a problem until the solution comes along.  Steve Jobs was a master of this approach.  People like Edison and Bell were as well.  However, for most of us, the identification of the problem – and the market for it – before creating a solution is a better way to spend our business days.  You get the point.  Me?  I suddenly have a hankering for guacamole.

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