Prove it! How we use analytics to help you make your case.

In eighth grade, Sister Catherine accused me of cheating. She tasked us with writing a book report on Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle, and then she stood in front of the entire class declaring that one of the papers must have been borrowed from an older sibling. While she couldn’t prove it, she was entirely sure she was correct, and she wanted the entire class to know that she knew. She swished through the room handing everyone back their papers, giving me mine last, and loudly demanding I stay after class. I should have responded with “prove it!”   

Had Sister Catherine asked how I wrote a paper with such an expansive vocabulary, she would have learned that I received a Thesaurus for Christmas (though, I can’t guarantee that I used all those words correctly in my paper). Instead, with no evidence presented, we went on with our lives. 

Sister Catherine relied solely on her assumption, neglecting any sort of analytic strategy. Now she’s the villain in a blog about the importance of data utilization.  

Data matters.  

Analytics requires a role in nearly every business decision. Here at DCG ONE, it’s a practice we utilize to support and elevate the impact of our creative experiences.  We approach analytics for our clients by following a methodical process: 

1. Analytics begins with a thorough understanding of our client’s business context, overall project goals, and what we hope to achieve together. This is the “it” in “prove it!”  
2. Next, we construct a measurement framework by calling on those goals to develop specific key performance indicators, identify the metrics we will need to collect for proper measurement, and ensure that we have the necessary technical gateways to collect them.  
3. We work with appropriate internal and external stakeholders to implement that plan across the appropriate technical tools.  
4. Finally, we develop a near-time dashboard to empower our clients to see these actionable insights in an efficient, digestible, and aesthetically pleasing way. 

With many of our clients, we provide ongoing analytics support using the data in the dashboard and industry trends to specifically highlight the best insights on a particular cadence, such as monthly, or quarterly. (Did anybody else get really intrigued watching how desktop traffic ticked up at the end of the COVID-19 pandemic, but then ticked back down at the end of 2023? No? Just me?)  

Imagine that we launch a new website with you and your goal is to help certain schoolteachers in South Florida realize that sophisticated vocabulary is accessible to students of all ages if they simply put a Thesaurus in their classroom. We drive site visitors to fill out a form on your website where they can indicate that they already encourage continuous literacy improvement, then they can either request a free Thesaurus or check the box next to, “No thanks, I hate kids.”   

We’ll make sure that we have Google or Adobe analytics on that site to collect engagement information, and then we’ll connect to your CRM so we can track your form fill content.  

Next, you log into to a dashboard to see how many people visited your site, and how many filled out your form. You drill into your data to see how many teachers requested a Thesaurus versus how many should maybe step aside and let a teacher take over who thinks that some kids just really like to read, and those students are totally cool.   

Then you find that most teachers either already have a Thesaurus in their classrooms or gladly accept one. Maybe you’ve now disproved your friend who insisted, based on one wayward data point, that all eighth-grade English teachers are evil. This is just spit balling of course. 

Following this process takes time, and varies from simple to complex, but we believe the resulting analytics hold value for stakeholders in any organizational role.  

Whenever I explain my job, my husband chimes in that when we go to dinner, he always passes me the check to calculate the tip, you know, because I’m “math-y.” If people want to believe I’m a statistical wizard, who am I to disagree (or disclose that I’m just moving a decimal point and then doubling plus a little more)? But the reality is that analytics is for everyone. Here at DCG ONE we find that that every job function can, and should, seek evidence to validate or invalidate our assumptions. Witnessing the world interact with our marketing doesn’t stifle creativity, it elevates it.  

Analytics matters to our clients because they need to understand the impact of their investment through us. It matters to our internal stakeholders because we seek to be strategic partners for our clients, and to continuously play with new and innovative ways to approach projects.  

As you peruse our website, you’ll find bold, eloquent claims about our impactful experiences. Analytics is a fundamental element in nearly all of our projects, so don’t worry, we can prove it!