After attending the "Analytics in the Executive Suite" panel at The Premier Business Leadership Series in Las Vegas, I came away with solid advice for companies looking to grow an analytics-based culture. Guidance came from representatives of companies with a strong analytics infrastructure: Eric Webster, State Farm Insurance; Barbara Pindar, Aeropostale; and Cameron Davies, Disney.
Pindar discussed the need to establish a long-range plan - e.g., what is your end goal, where do you want to be in the next several years? Aeropostale created a three-year plan and is on track. Of course you'll need to tweak it, refine it along the way - but have a compass to set the direction of what you're trying to accomplish.
Also, partner with your technology team. The Aeropostale tech team is very business savvy, and this is critical to its success.
Davies admits that Disney is still learning how to incorporate analytics more heavily across the organization but adds that you need to invest in the right people. Don't cheap out on hiring or the technology for that matter. You need to right tools to make it happen.
Go after the low-hanging fruit, Davies continues. See where you can spend the least and get to market the fastest and build credibility with these wins. They will loosen funding and integrate analytics into the culture steadily.
Webster says to make sure you give the analytics team time to pursue directions that are not driven by the client, because sometimes clients don’t know what to ask for. People on the front lines of analytics will see things that others won’t. They might ask, for example, why doesn’t anyone use this data or look at this? The most interesting projects that had impact were never asked for by clients. An added benefit is that it increases credibility and boosts morale of the analytics group.
The panel then talked about what's next on the docket for their analytics plans.
Davies would like to get a better measurement of creative efforts. He wants to know how to measure whether or not this movie is going to be a hit. Will this creative work? Polyphonics tells you what to tweak to create a hit song, is there a way to do that for Internet content, movies?
Pindar looks forward to delving deeper into predicting the future versus focusing on past events. And Webster would like to optimize marketing spend. He'd like to know how much to put into radio, TV, etc. - one can never get too good at that.
