The Hype around Big Data
Unless you’ve been living underneath a rock the past couple years, you’d have noticed that practically every article on the Internet has mentioned Big Data in some way or another.
And unless you’re complete nerds like us, you probably aren’t all that confident on what it is or why you should know about it.
Big Data is an all-encompassing term for vast quantities of data. This can include, but not limited to: surveys, searches, downloads, uploads, videos, images, social conversations, wearable technology data, and even some offline sources.
By examining these large pools of data we can extract insights, and even begin to make predictions.
Companies hear about Big Data and like every other buzzword, think that it’s something they need.
In the midst of the hype companies are overlooking something that could prove to be much more valuable to them: the Small Data.
Small Data
Big data isn’t bad, it’s just not the whole story. For companies that don’t know how to use their own small data, the big data probably won’t matter.
Small Data is the information and data you collect from your own audience. It’s the data sets that you collect from your own sources, and from your own audience.
For example, if you’re an eCommerce company, the case would be something like this:
Big Data = Generalization that comes from a large pool of data
Example: More than half of all online adults 65 and older (56%) use Facebook. This represents 31% of all seniors. (Source: Pew Internet Social Media Update 2014)
Small Data = Specific and Niche to your audience
Example: While only 18% of our Facebook audience are 55+, nearly 70% of our revenue comes from customers over 65. (Source: Not real data)
Big Data can be a great starting point for building your strategy, but knowing the specific data about your own audience’s behaviors make marketing decisions a bit easier, doesn’t it?
The problem
While certain insights from Big Data can be helpful for identifying trends, it is not all that helpful in understanding the subtle nuances of their own audience.
Companies need to specifically understand their own audience. But relying on small data alone can be challenging as well since often times there is not enough information to base decisions on.
Big Data is becoming more widely available and a lot of it is freely available.
Big Data reveals trends to us, but small data tells us the buying trends of our own customers.
Data-Driven Marketing is Here to Stay
When clients hire a Marketing Consultant, one of their immediate questions will be: “What’s going to be my ROI?”
As a marketer, it is becoming more important than ever to understand how to tie together Technology, Analytics, Big Data, and Small Data.
It all starts with asking the right questions in order to clearly define goals.
Once there are clear objectives, then take a look at customer data to understand your specific audience and what they’re doing. THEN look at the big data and understand how your audience fits into the bigger story-line.
The only way to understand online-audiences is through data, but most companies won’t know what to measure unless they can define what their goals are and what it takes to reach them.
How to Put them Together
Organize the chaos. Figure out what data you want to keep and what data you want to query.
- Are you building brand awareness? Measure visits, conversations, blog comments, etc.
- Is your email marketing working? Measure the increase in website visits, referrals from email links, how long they’re spending on that email.
- Are your Social Medias working? Look for where your referral traffic is coming from; Is that traffic leading to sales?
- Are you reaching the right audience? Look at your Facebook Insights, see if your Fans/audience are the ones who are engaging with you. If not, pivot.
Big data may help you understand how to reach a certain target audience on a large scale, but the small data is what allows companies to measure the impact of any particular marketing activity.
Start small
Extract insights from the big data to make better Marketing decisions, but do not ignore all of the smaller details you already have somewhere in your analytics.
You will learn to appreciate your customers’ mind-set by looking at your Small data, rather than thinking about the company’s goals to reach the bigger audience.
Remember, it’s not about being perfect, it’s about consistently making progress toward better and more efficient marketing.