Tim Wilson: Paubox Zoom social mixer (October 2023)

The Paubox Zoom social mixer for October 2023 featured a presentation on how organizations can use their research and analytics to drive value through performance measurement, hypothesis validation, and operational enablement, by Tim Wilson, co-creator and host of the Analytics Power Hour.

What's happening: Paubox Zoom social mixers allow our customers and prospects to network and learn new trends.

Why it matters: At this month's mixer, our guest speaker, Tim Wilson discussed three ways to efficiently put research and analytics to productive ese.

Tim Wilson has been working with digital data full-time since 2001 in a variety of roles, both in-house and as an external consultant. His primary focus is working with organizations to develop and implement strategies, processes, and tactics for effectively putting their data to actionable use. He co-founded the bi-weekly Analytics Power Hour podcast in 2015 and has continued as a co-host ever since. Tim is physically based in Columbus, Ohio, while his heart and soul maintain joint custody with Austin, Texas.

Tim explained why it's all too easy to dive into a sea of data in search of insights only to emerge hours later with a 40-slide deck full of charts and graphs...and a sinking feeling that it's not clear at all as to how those charts and graphs can move the business forward.

The presentation explored the three distinct ways that organizations can use their research and analytics to drive value: performance measurement, hypothesis validation, and operational enablement. Tim  explored how all three of these rely on creative, strategic, and smart human thought at the outset. And, as (seemingly) required by the International Laws of Marketing as of December 2022, Tim shared his perspective on where generative AI fits into this framework.

Our takeaways:

• We probably have enough data - it's about what we do with the data we have.
• There are three buckets of what we can do with data:
  
  • Performance measurement - are we delivering value?
    
  • Hypothesis validation - what action/decision can we make to have a positive impact (reduce uncertainty)
    
  • Operational enablement - develop processes
    
• When measuring performance (KPIs) it's easy to look at too many metrics because we haven't defined what's actually important.
  
• There are two magic questions to pick the right performance measurements:
  
  • What are we trying to achieve?
    
  • How will we know if we've done that?
• A hypothesis is just a tentative assumption.
• Consider creating a hypothesis library (spreadsheet) to keep track of hypotheses or intake hypotheses.
  
• How do we test a hypothesis if data is poor? If you use true randomization between a test and control group, you should still get valid results.
  
• Assuming the negation of what you're trying to prove can help you find data.
  

We also discussed interesting use cases with Paubox Marketing and customers shared how their organizations used email marketing.

The bottom line: We learned that effective analytics requires knowing what you'd like to achieve, setting a hypothesis, and taking action.

See also: Our playbook for Zoom social mixers

See also: HIPAA Compliant Email: The Definitive Guide