4 minute read
Building A Culture of Experimentation
THERE’S REAL POWER IN DATA-DRIVEN MARKETING
WRITTEN BY: ARI SHEINKIN, VICE PRESIDENT, EXPERIENCE ENGINE, IBM
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I work for IBM, so it won’t surprise you that I believe in data-driven marketing. Having helped dozens of organizations use data to transform for growth, I’ve come to recognize that the most successful companies do something beyond their data-lake, their martech or their AI/ML; they build a culture of experimentation. In the simplest terms that means they experiment – a lot. At a deeper level, they use tools like a/b and multivariate testing to reshape their culture to be more user-centric, more boldly creative, less afraid of failure, more agile and more fun.
If you haven’t experienced it yet, here are four reasons why experimentation matters to your business.
EXPERIMENTATION GIVES YOU THE BEST USER DATA IN THE WORLD
In a digital world, the most valuable data for decision making doesn’t sit in a database, you can’t query it or ask a data scientist. In a digital world, you create your own insight by putting your experience into the market as a structured experiment. This starts by taking your most imaginative idea (maybe the one you were afraid to pitch) and surrounding it with testable hypotheses. Better than focus groups or research, every user click is unfiltered feedback on your message, your design, your product, your experience. It’s the best data in the world, it’s direct from your user, and it’s free.
EXPERIMENTATION MARRIES THE ART AND SCIENCE OF MARKETING
Marketing is a balance between the artistic process and the scientific method. Despite the perceived conflict, I have never met a creative person who doesn’t want more insight into user behavior. Similarly, I’ve never met an analytics person who doesn’t want their data to help share the user experience. Experimentation bridges the traditional divide by making analytics part of the creative process. Every creative choice is an opportunity to test, and every test is an opportunity to push the bounds of creativity.
EXPERIMENTATION DELIVERS BUSINESS RESULTS FAST
It’s amazing the difference a word can make. Or a color. Or the placement of a button. In my first year introducing experimentation to IBM, we averaged triple digit improvement across our target metrics in digital. As an example, increasing the color contrast between the call-to-action button and the background on our web pages drove over 100% higher engagement within days.
From those modest early tests, we moved on to big, bold audience personalization experiments that delivered up to 2,000% better performance. In turn, these results inspired more traditional parts of the business to join the movement. Today we use experimentation to bridge the physical and digital worlds to create holistic customer journey innovation.
EXPERIMENTATION CHANGES YOUR CULTURE
Every company I consult with wants to become more agile and more data driven. Experimentation offers a practical path. First, it changes the organization’s sense of risk by lowering the cost of failure. In a culture of experimentation, well designed projects can’t fail, they always create new learning. Second, experimentation increases speed by shifting the focus from planning to getting into market. It has been amazing to watch parts of IBM evolve from quarterly planning to realtime decision making. Finally, it democratizes data by putting power into the hands of the marketer.
When I started, IBM had seven live tests all run through our CIO. Today we have thousands of experiments conceived by hundreds of marketers across media, web, email, events and more.
Experimentation brings agile to life, makes data accessible, infuses scientific thinking into the fabric of creative work and makes money. Once you experience a culture of experimentation, you never go back.
