Recently I came across Marketingland.com’s article, “5 Reasons Marketers Fail With Data“.

According to a recent study, most companies and marketers find it difficult to gain insights from their data.  Most marketers are still chasing after the same goals:

“How do we most effectively make the right people aware of our products and services, get them to take actions we want them to take? And then how do we figure out what we did right and wrong so we can do it again, only this time more efficiently?”

The article suggests five areas marketers can work at to “embrace data and better use it for your marketing activities.”

This thought stood out to me:

“If you’re a marketer who has done everything right to collect, integrate, trust and analyze the data, then unfortunately you’re only about 10% of the way there. The other 90% — the important 90% — is to effect change with the data. Action it and provide value. And that’s often the most difficult part of data and analytics in a marketing environment.”

What I appreciate about this article is that it speaks to a common mistake I’ve seen many marketers make over the years.  Often times, I see companies that have these percentages flipped. They spend 10% effecting change, when in reality, as this article states, to generate action within the data and provide value is where the resources should be allocated. We’ve helped companies to continue to focus on their “zone of genius” when they allow us, the data partner to become the story teller.