Demystifying Data Analysis

In the world of media, marketing, apps and software, we are inundated with data. Arguably, we have more data than we'll ever know what to do with and it gets increasingly difficult to make sense of it all. It can feel overwhelming, and if you're not well versed in working with data, it can feel too much and you end up reverting to instinct rather than data. It's fair to say that instinct did ok for Steve Jobs but most people don't have his genius so are better off relying on data.

But what do you do when you're faced with loads of data after interviewing lots of people about a certain product, website or general day to day habits? This is a core part of anyone who works in user-experience. They're the people who work out what customers need or want or how they're using something and translate that into improving how your website or app will work. Of course, sometimes the advice is ignored, but in the main, it's advice you should be listening to.

If you're an SME or start-up or, perhaps, pre-startup, you can't always afford a dedicated user experience person to work with you but you need to start somewhere. This article from Rachel Hinman is a great starting point to give you a simple structure to working your way through your data to gain insights from it. Check it out now.

Day 20/30 NaBloPoMo

From the archives - It's Throw Back Thursday time again

So this time ten years ago, I was just back from my second visit to The Electric Picnic in Ireland. By all accounts, I'd had a fab time despite rain and the ensuing mud. My review of the weekend is here.

Location Based Services

Meanwhile, 10 years ago, DoCoMo was trialling in-mall location based marketing. It's weird that this was 6 years AFTER we'd done this at ZagMe and even weirder is that it was 10 years ago and we're only just beginning to see location based services (or proximity as it's known now) come to fruition. Brand Republic wrote a half decent piece on the potential of mobile for marketing and advertising. Remember, this is pre iPhone App Store days and Nokia was the best selling manufacturer by a country mile.

Branded TV Channels

In September 2006, Anheuser Busch announced they were setting up and investing US$30 million in their own TV channel for Budweiser drinkers called Bud.TV. 10 years ago, this was forward thinking and arguably, ahead of its time as it closed down in 2009 as they deemed it too expensive to sustain and the audience couldn't easily access it. Critics suggested that it closed down as the content wasn't relevant and limited in its appeal. More on the demise of Bud.TV and other branded content channels here.I would suggest that timing is key. Branded channels per se are not necessarily a bad idea. Look at the content that Red Bull comes up with that now hits mainstream TV. Bud.TV may just have been ahead of its time.

Design

Stephanie and Bryan Rieger are long-serving designers and mobilists. They are mavens of what works in mobile design and this presentation, 'Letting Go', from 5 years ago is well worth a look to remind you of what's what in mobile design. It's also a lesson in how to create beautiful presentations. 

But what about the children?

Throughout my time in mobile, there have been people thinking about how to use mobile devices to monitor and track where their kids are. They are generally a terrible idea - if a teen wants to escape your digital clutches, they are more than capable of doing that with or without the fancy tracker you've bought. I'm not really sure why they keep resurfacing. However, this one that friend and mobile ally, Carlo Longino, wrote about back in 2004 takes the biscuit name-wise. Read all about 'TeenArriveAlive.com' over on Mobhappy. It's a great takedown and well worth a read.

More from the archives soon!

Linkage on a Tuesday

A few things I've been reading and thought were worth sharing...

• A good read here from a Greek tech and food entrepreneur telling his story of idea to execution to early success to failure to learning to pivot to greater success. 

• How a fake food business won an award. A salutary tale of how to game social media via buying 'influencers' and what this means for your online marketing strategy. 

• Why am I being paid less than my male colleagues? TLDR probably because you never asked for more money and didn't negotiate. I've heard this before that women don't tend to negotiate. Men negotiate from their first salary so get ahead early on. It doesn't occur to women to do the same. A lesson in negotiation here for men and women of all ages.

• This next one isn't news to me, but it may be news to you and is one of the reasons why I keep banging on about gender discrimination. Having women on your team makes for a better business:

Companies with three or more corporate directors who are women (in at least four out of five years) outperformed those with no women on the board by 84% on return on sales, 60% on return on invested capital and 46% on return on equity.

Also

A 2009 study in Silicon Valley found that venture-backed companies run by women had annual revenues that were 12% higher, used an average of one third less committed capital and had lower failure rates than those led by men.

There's more in this article about addressing the gender gap in angel investing. 

•  This post from Terence Eden is great looking at user-centred design and creating personas when creating websites, apps and services. Entitled 'Debuffs, Enchantment, Equipment, and Players - an RPG Player's Guide to User Stories. I highly recommend.

Thanks for reading.