At the risk of offending the world of analytics, I would posit that most of the world does not need to worry about "Big Data"... and thus has no cause to worry about "Big Insights" either. Most companies have no idea what data they've got, let alone if it's Big, or not. The other problem I've seen is companies who have data, and have decided to declare it Big... without knowing what other data they need or already have access to.
This does not mean that a mom & pop can't have Big Insights from Small Data. This also does not mean that a multi-national can only get Small Insights from Big Data.
What it does mean is that trying to claim you have Big or Small anything is kind of pointless.
Okay, fine... you have to put a stake in the sand at some point. That stake, though, is for your current decision. "Analysis Paralysis" does not mean "Analysis Stagnation".
Let's see... that six cliches in three paragraphs... that's enough.
Let's take a practical application.
I'm a mid-sized company, with a sales force, a moderately aggressive direct marketing campaign, purchases of radio and television time in several top markets, banner ad buys, as well as a social media advertising tactical approach.
My sales team has decided that my representatives will be making the classic 8 calls a day. I will send out 3 direct mailers every quarter. I'm running cable ad buys, talk radio hour mid-day ads, as well as intermittent satellite radio ads. I buy Facebook ads targeted at my demographic and run promoted Twitter ads.
If you take what I've seen most companies use as a typical approach, that's anywhere from 4-6 different campaigns with different KPIs, with different budget line items, with different objectives, and with different data stores.
My sales targets are now being subjected to multiple touches, and those 4-6 categories each count this as their max number of touches.
Meanwhile, my customer has grown tired of being touched so many $*&^&%@# times.
An insight here, of some non-identified size, is that it would be nice if I knew how many times my whole company was touching a customer. I can't begin to do this unless I have some kind of coordinated data infrastructure.
All that money I spend on 8 calls a day? Well, maybe it should be 6 times a day, with pull-through of mailers, ads, and social tactics instead...
All that money I spend on 3 mailers a quarter? Maybe it should be 1 because I've got sales representatives in the office and my clients are all touchable via media buys, as well social media outreach.
If I don't coordinate my data sources, and don't have a unified data infrastructure, I could be wasting budget line items that could be better used elsewhere... or I could be missing opportunities because I need to be spending more money everywhere.
Now imagine what you can do if you integrate social data with sales data... or your key opinion leaders with social activity related to nearby teaching centers... or how you could efficiently promote that new contract win through your partner's social channels and your press release contacts...
Your data needs to be as coordinated as it can be. You need to make a decision. You need to act. Then you need to look at your data sources again, so that your next decision is as coordinated as it can be.
14 April NOTE: I'm looking for a new gig, so feel free to reach out to me if this kind of thing is a problem you've got in your organisation and you'd like me to come talk to you about how we can work together to bring your coordination and integration into your next set of decisions.
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