Not everything needs to be ‘data-driven’

Data certainly has its utility value, but also its fair share of blind spots.

The message is clear – record the data, track it, analyse it, then follow it to a tee. Make adjustments, pivot or even abandon entire endeavours because ‘that’s what the data says’.

The unambiguous hype has a point, after all; data is the by-product of every single interaction borne for and out of your organisation. From employees to customers, every single stakeholder’s actions are displayed in the form of numbers, tables, graphs, and the occasional pie chart.

And this is just the treasure trove from internal avenues. Externally, research data from surveys, the markets and your competitors can shed even more light on what’s going on, and what you can do.

An entire industry has been built around this. Think business intelligence. Heck, AI is chock full of use cases for predictive analytics no matter which way you look!

So how can this ever be refuted?

Certainly, making decisions based on data just cannot be the wrong thing to do under any circumstances, now would it?

Not always.

Although data is a strong and reliable indicator often, it isn’t foolproof – and can fall short in certain situations.

Instead, doing the polar opposite of what’s been drilled into us through podcast buzz or pedantic boardroom etiquette can actually reap results, or revive something stagnant – listening to individual anecdotes and sometimes, our intuition.

The blind spots of data

Going down the rabbit hole of statistical jargon

It’s all too common for organisations to be hyper-focused towards the very statistics that comprise their KPIs. And why not? Your KPIs are, after all, the barometer for whether things are happening in a manner that is beneficial to all parties involved.

Don’t get me wrong – I’m a firm believer in KPIs myself. But there are select situations when numbers can be given a rest, while you let an intangible vision that cannot otherwise be seen through numbers, take centre stage.

It’s why investors lose money by just looking at valuation figures. It’s also the reason why follower counts don’t mean more revenue.

So always take a step back and look at the bigger picture. Your business will thank you for it. Of course, this is a level of astuteness that only comes through experience. But there’s no harm in exercising all-round perception, before making decisions that will alter the course of what your business strives for.

Also read: The obsession with marketing – before doing any product development

An obsession to only do what your competitors are doing

Data has the tendency to also bring FOMO, especially when it relates to your competitors. Let’s say you landscape all your competitors, based on market share, online search demand, and the calibre of advertising you see happening for products and services similar to yours.

The next moment, you notice competitor brand 2 releasing a TVC that’s eerily similar to competitor brand 1. By this point, the decision making teams’ minds at your competition are pretty much predetermined to simply follow suit, instead of understanding whether doppelgänger marketing of this nature is even going to help whatever hurdles they have.

And that defeats the purpose of using any kind of data for decision-making, right?

The lack of a status quo

When embarking on anything new, there is always at least one data point that helps you decide why you should pursue it. However, newness also brings forth its share of the unknown. While the data itself states a fact (for e.g. a certain demographic preferring one flavour over the other), what could happen post execution (i.e. releasing that new flavour where that demographic is most likely to prevail) largely remains unclear.

Again, predictive analytics can help you foresee the future, but until you don’t try, you won’t actually know. This serves more as a reminder – use data to guide you, but don’t get so dependent on it that you forgo placing any contingencies and avoid starting with small investments, for ventures and campaigns that are new to your brand.

The inability to provide a breakthrough during stagnant times

You’ve got a cadence in place for tracking and reporting, but the data just seems… underwhelming. Either that, or you aren’t seeing the kind of lift you expected after pivoting, based on the last round of reporting.

So what’s happening here?

At a moment of stagnation such as this, an intervention is likely needed – as what you’ve been doing simply by looking at your data isn’t working.

However, clues still abound from your data. So start there. For example, two customer inquiries centred around a new feature for your product. But two inquiries alone aren’t sufficient to justify building a brand new feature.

But then again, sales are stagnant. So is it all that bad an idea to pivot towards incorporating this new feature?

Sure, constraints may be a hindrance; after all, how does it make financial sense to scale an entire team for a feature that only two customers have expressed an interest for?

If this is the case, it doesn’t do any harm to at least dig a little deeper:

• Narrow your research towards that one data point, by conducting customer surveys.
• Release an MVP or a beta version of the feature, to gauge how your customers receive it.
• Discuss and understand the people, processes, timelines and costs involved with such a rollout.

Even if you don’t implement, you have a comprehensive idea of what this task could take, at the very least – priming you and your team for a possible rollout in future.

Big numbers don’t always mean big breakthroughs.

Much potential also lies in smaller clues – you just need to be observant enough to identify them, and keep a mindset open enough to act on them.

Also read: The four harsh realities of lead generation

When data-driven decisions aren’t always needed (no, really)

When you’re venturing into something new

It’s quite likely that you’re bound to have negligible data for a new product, variant or market, if you are wondering about starting something new. Either that, or the data you’ve got is external and more macro-level; think competitor analyses, market research and overall sentiment from customers towards a certain product.

At this point, it’s safe to venture with the little information you have. But make sure you start small (minimal investments, MVPs/pilots etc.) and you confidently know that sidelining data is the viable thing to do here.

Venturing towards new endeavours do need a little faith, after all.

When you’ve hit a lull in your existing efforts

Your team is executing away, but the results you had expected haven’t appeared, even after careful predictive analytics and data-backed decision making. So what’s missing?

You need to break the monotony, and one way you could do that is to implement a concept you or your team has had in mind. Especially if it’s been for quite a while. You know, those musings that surface during relaxed watercooler sessions, or while waiting for other team members to join a meeting?

Yes, those ideas. Maybe they aren’t that crazy after all.

This doesn’t mean you fire in the dark, though! But instead, you capitalise on the sliver of insight from whatever data you already have.

Which brings me to my next point…

When you notice a brief yet promising pattern

In this case scenario, data IS available – but it’s minuscule, and not enough to deliver substantive results. However, this doesn’t mean that you cannot proceed. If you notice even the smallest data point to be promising, this may be your chance to capitalise on it – which goes back to my point of reviving your strategies, during lulled phases.

Sometimes, all we need is one clue to kick things off – instead of waiting on a tranche of data-led insights.

It’s how detectives conduct investigations from a crime scene; they don’t wait for all the facts, they start with a single clue, and solve onward.

So yes, you can go off the conventional path, provided you know when it’s appropriate. Ironically, some of these situations still do get a sense of direction from data – but it is very much preliminary, and minuscle.

The key lies in reading between those proverbial lines.

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