Trust your gut, but verify it with facts

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Good morning, Marketer, don’t forget to laugh today.

Hunches get a bad rap in our data-driven world of marketing. The desire to have metrics is both understandable and laudable. No one is suggesting they aren’t essential. However, as Ruben Ugarte discusses in this great article, no matter how good an analytics program is, it can’t find insights for you.

Those come from an experienced, questioning marketer noticing something in the data. That’s the hunch. Now, the hunch itself isn’t enough. It needs to be checked out and backed up by facts. That’s when the hunch becomes an insight, something you can take action on. Ruben has some solid suggestions about that, too. Read on!

Constantine von Hoffman,
Managing Editor

About The Author

Constantine von Hoffman is managing editor of MarTech. A veteran journalist, Con has covered business, finance, marketing and tech for CBSNews.com, Brandweek, CMO, and Inc. He has been city editor of the Boston Herald, news producer at NPR, and has written for Harvard Business Review, Boston Magazine, Sierra, and many other publications. He has also been a professional stand-up comedian, given talks at anime and gaming conventions on everything from My Neighbor Totoro to the history of dice and boardgames, and is author of the magical realist novel John Henry the Revelator. He lives in Boston with his wife, Jennifer, and either too many or too few dogs.