Visualising the Geek Within

One of the things I enjoy most about the planning department at Weapon7 is the fact that all the planners sit together – account planners alongside data and social media planners. All with a wide mix of experience and working on a variety of accounts across the agency, sometimes independently and often together. But before I get too happy families it’s worth pointing out that there is one tiny drawback: it turns you into an absolute geek.

My current ‘geekism’ is Data Visualisation (damn data planners).

It all started innocently with a light reading of Edward R Tufte’s “The Cognitive Style of PowerPoint: Pitching Out Corrupts Within” (OK, it does sound very plannery but any man who can quote Jas Elsner’s “Imperial Rome and Christian Triumph” in one sentence before summarising Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address in six slides deserves a look in my book). Then, before I knew it, I had blogs like ‘Analytics Arbitrage’ and ‘Extreme Presentation' infiltrating my iGoogle.

I just can’t help myself – I’m fascinated with cool ways of visualising data. Give a boy with a hint of OCD the chance to see the frequency and typology of “I need” phrases on twitter using a zoomable decision tree and, well, there goes the afternoon. I’m hooked. I’m like a kid with one of those ‘Magic Eye’ books from the 90s.

There is some (post-rationalised) method in the obsession though. Planners often muse that there’s insight in even seemingly meaningless bits of information - you've just got to find them.

These smart visualisations force you to look at data in new and engaging ways that allow these lovely info nuggets to shine. They bring the hidden to the fore, the ignored to the centre of attention and the meaningless to the front of mind. And, if you consider the amount of snippets of data left behind on digital media by people everyday and you've got yourself a galactic starscape of insight waiting to be found through a visualising click, zoom, drag, twist or twirl. Brilliant.

Here’s what I’m particularly hooked on at the moment:
BBC’s Britain from Above (especially the plane one),
Watching the Growth of Walmart across America from 1962 (if you zoom out too far the US looks pretty scary),
The Ebb and Flow of Movies – Box Office Receipts 1986-2008,
Great little video of the role of data day to day (and a good tune too),
A Visual Guide to Where Federal Tax Dollars Go.

Before I have to forcibly end this latest obsession I should probably have a stab myself. So here’s my final homage to data planning:

(Bollocks to the above, I’m old school at heart.)

Veni Vidi Data-avi(?)

OK - dodgy title I know (and will probably do bugger all for search traffic) but anyway, this week I was asked to right a couple of paragraphs on my opinion on the role of data in today's media climate. So I thought I'd share.

Media use, habits and diets have been changing steadily for several years – ‘Media stacking’, the Internet, e-mail, mobile phones, and so on. Unsurprisingly, changes in consumer behaviour have followed. As Bob Liodice (President and CEO of the Association of National Advertisers) confirms, “It’s no longer a matter of if consumers change their behaviour, but how fast and whether we can keep up.” Never has understanding the consumer been so important.

Today the customer journey may not be any longer than it was 10 years ago, but it is has certainly become much more random and harder to follow. Our traditional ‘funnel’ has become a snakes and ladders board.

Luckily, the increased use of digital technology has created a magnifying effect allowing us observe what consumers are thinking, experiencing and doing relative to the buying process with greater clarity and granularity than ever before. We now have access to real time information about what people search for, buy and how they make their purchase decisions. Facts, figures, likes, dislikes and so on. The value of data has increased tenfold*, if not more.
However, this data, unless it is harnessed, will remain nothing more than facts, figures, likes and dislikes.

Despite this changing landscape the basic principle of delivering the right message to the right people at the right time holds true. In today’s climate it is essential that we use this wealth of raw information to form real insights and a superior understanding of our consumers. Only then can we respond to what we’ve learned quickly and with a greater degree of relevance irrelevant of media.

We are no longer media-centric, but consumer-centric instead.


And there we go. Thoughts?


*Allen Adamson's new book BrandDigital was insightful on this