The importance of data based decision making (part 1)

I have been recently interviewed by The Telegraph on behalf of the British Retail Consortium to share my views about data-based decision making, the profile of a good analyst, how to empower analysts in modern organisational setups and a few more topics.

I thought to share a transcript of my interview in some "pills", one for each question I was asked.

Please comment and share, I hope you'll enjoy reading.

Question 1 - It’s often said that sellers have seven seconds to captivate their audience or lose them to the competition. What do they have to get right in that time?

You have to know your customers and be relevant to them. 

The advent of mobile has changed the customer behavior towards shorter attention spans, moving away from dedicated research sessions into scattered breadcrumb sessions, on the tube, while waiting in a line, even while driving! Often these interactions happen on multiple channels, so companies have to imagine how to maximize their relevance in these short time spans, managing to deliver a seamless continuum for the customer to explore.

The good news is that today’s users are willing to give a lot of information about what they want, data companies can collect and use, and they share these happily when they have the confidence that these data will be used to give them a better service. So it’s a matter of using data in the right way, establishing a trust-based relationship that thrives in mutual benefit over time.

Question 2 - How can sellers best provide potential customers with enough reasons to trust them? How do you get inside their heads?

With data and analytics: Understanding customers is the key to become relevant to them.

Today’s customers have the chance to interact with a brand or a product in “digital ways” (a website, an app…) and, by simply using these measurable channels, they leave lots of hints on what they like, what they don’t like and what’s relevant to them.

Also, the advent of the internet of things has facilitated the merging of the 2 worlds, online and offline, so companies can now learn about user behavior from ovens, washing machines, watches and other items.

There are 4 steps that companies have to get right in order to succeed in getting into their customers’ heads:

1. record as many data as possible
2. distill the “noise” data from the data that means something relevant and actionable
3. allow these “signals” to become insights and inform decisions
4. create “Rules and algorithms” that allow decision making to be automated.

If done right, these tools allow companies to give customers exactly what they want, when they want it, sometimes even anticipating their needs.

More to come, stay tuned!