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Just because you have numbers doesn't mean you have insight

6 January, 2012
2
by Rob Cottingham

One of the most seductive things about social media is the way it allows us to quantify things. I have more friends than she does – I must be more popular. That blog post got more hits than this one, so that one's more effective. We have more Twitter followers this month than last month, so we're on the right track.

Numbers are lovely that way. In a world where everything seems open to interpretation, numbers offer certainty. Five is bigger than three: end of argument.

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Cold turkey

(woman to friend walking down the street, seeing everyone with click counts hovering over their heads) Maybe you should lay off the analytics for a while.

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Conversation: the ultimate analytic

Can't get an answer from Google Analytics? Ask your users.

27 October, 2010
3
by Rob Cottingham

I had something of a happy mystery yesterday: a huge surge in traffic on one of my Noise to Signal cartoons with no apparent reason why.

That's the kind of mystery I dearly love to solve. Not just because I'm nosey, but also because I'd like to thank whoever's responsible. So I donned my deerstalker, broke out the virtual magnifying glass and started an investigation.

I solved that mystery... but discovered something a lot more important in the process.

Here's how I proceeded:

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Metrics: handy tool, or Satan's yardstick?

Can individuals use marketing tools without sacrificing authenticity?

22 September, 2009
1
by Rob Cottingham

Alex's Harvard post about metrics and the obsessive condition she calls analytophilia has triggered a lot of conversation this morning about the role analytics ought to play in organizational communications.

Which has me thinking about the role tools like analytics play in our personal communications online, too - for better and for worse.

The past few years have seen some fascinating changes as organizations - some tentative, some confident, a few very bold - adopt the tools of the social web. We've seen windows and occasionally great big doors opening in the walls that separate businesses, non-profits and governments from the public.

But something else is happening too. Just as the tools of social media are turning marketing into personal conversation, they're also turning personal conversation into marketing.

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