Healthy skepticism is a part of human nature - it's probably an involuntary defense mechanism that has been refined as we've evolved as social beings. And in today's world of scripted "reality" TV shows, internet hoaxes and celebrity "farewell" tours, healthy skepticism can help you quickly steer clear of things that waste your time (always a good thing).

Marketers are no strangers to skepticism. Our friends in sales never think we're doing enough, while our friends in accounting may think we're doing too much. And everyone has their own idea on how we can be doing things better. So what to do?

Few things are more powerful to sway a skeptic or to quickly make your point than visualization - literally allowing them to "see to believe." Visualization is particularly useful for decision-making with big data because it allows you to quickly see patterns and redirect your efforts based on the analyzing the whole data set and not a random sample that's extrapolated.

You don't believe me? See for yourself in this online demo of SAS Visual Analytics applied to customer analysis. The demo shows a great example of how you can analyze your sales and marketing performance to find how to improve your marketing through forecasting, goal seeking, scenario analysis, decision trees, path analysis and other analytic visualizations.

SAS Visual Analytics is a powerful way to enhance your customer intelligence. It lets you quickly get your own data, pinpoint issues and paint the picture so you can answer your own questions - or address your skeptics.

Either way you're in the driver's seat, and there's no better place to be.