Quality data is available at a click of your fingers, completely free of charge. Businesses now have data points from which to analyse success; from website analytics and email responses to social media engagement and customer satisfaction data.
By Sean Blanks, marketing director of CartridgeSave.co.uk
The ability to harness this data will mark the winners from the losers. It will enable you to understand what turns your customers on – and off – and will be key to creating, implementing and refining new services and products that are in line with their needs.
But how do you turn the endless figures into coherent analysis? We’ve put together a list of our top tips to get you started.
We mean you!
No matter what your business is – whether you’re a hairdresser, gardener or the next Google – you need to know how to analyse data. Comparing competitor prices, measuring the success of one service over another, are all important to getting ahead.
As is working out your short-term goals, your medium term targets (implementing the quick wins), and your long-term aim (where do you want your business to be?). Whatever your business is, you need to know what you’re aiming for and measure all the variables that help you achieve that end goal.
Tool up
Get your hands on the right tools. Start with the basics such as Google Analytics and become a frequent visitor to the site. We’d recommend popping by on a daily basis so you can closely monitor the impact of a new service, new offer or new page.
This allows you to quickly recognise where something is going well and increase the activity; conversely you can pull the plug early on poor performers.
Obsess
Adopt a single-minded approach and learn to obsess over data. By systematically concentrating on just one or two things at a time, you can test a system to finality.
Monitoring the analytics closely, testing the entire spectrum of variable until you find the perfect combination.
Look to your neighbours
Look at who is doing well. What could you learn from them and their approach? Always see yourself as the underdog and position your peers as people to aspire to. There’s nothing wrong in rising to the competition.
Keep it in-house
Don’t outsource analytics, even if statistics are not your bag. You need to know what your customers respond to in order to lead your company onto bigger and better things. Make analysis your bible and learn the language of stats.
Black and white is not always right
Always question your data. A little bit of paranoia goes a long way.
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