Lean Analytics

Highlights

• A good metric is comparative. Being able to compare a metric to other time periods, groups of users, or competitors helps you understand which way things are moving.
• A good metric is understandable. If people can’t remember it and discuss it, it’s much harder to turn a change in the data into a change in the culture.
• A good metric is a ratio or a rate.
• Exploratory metrics are speculative and try to find unknown insights to give you the upper hand, while reporting metrics keep you abreast of normal, managerial, day-to-day operations.
• Leading metrics give you a predictive understanding of the future; lagging metrics explain the past.
• If you find a causal relationship between something you want (like revenue) and something you can control (like which ad you show), then you can change the future.
• Quantitative data abhors emotion; qualitative data marinates in it.
• Whenever you look at a metric, ask yourself, “What will I do differently based on this information?” If you can’t answer that question, you probably shouldn’t worry about the metric too much.
• change favors local maxima; innovation favors global disruption.
• When you know what the right question is, you’ll know what metric to track in order to answer that question.
• failure that comes from planned, methodical testing is simply how you learn. It moves things forward in the end. It’s how you avoid big-F Failure.
• Whatever your current OMTM, expect it to change. And expect that change to reveal the next piece of data you need to build a better business faster.
• Sergio Zyman, Coca-Cola’s CMO, said marketing is about selling more stuff to more people more often for more money more efficiently.[
• If you look at the repurchase rate on a 90-day cycle, it becomes a very good leading indicator for what type of e-commerce site you have. There’s no right or wrong answer, but it is important to know whether to focus more on loyalty or more on acquisition.