The Digital Analytics Power Hour

#112: Demystifying Data Science with Ian Thomas

Apr 9 • 53 min

Are you a data scientist? I mean, are you really a data scientist? What does that even mean…other than a healthy salary increase? On this episode of the show, Ian Thomas, Chief Data Officer for Publicis Spine sat down with the three…

#111: Automation in Analytics with Erik Driessen

Mar 26 • 51 min

We thought we deserved a break from the podcast, so we went looking for some AI to take over the episode. Amazon Polly wasn’t quite up to the task, unfortunately, so we wound up sitting down as humans with another human — Erik Driessen from…

#110: Creating Balanced Teams (and Avoiding Groupthink)

Mar 7 • 54 min

In recognition of International Women’s Day, and because it’s a really important topic, this is a very special episode. The two straight, white, cisgender male co-hosts of this podcast sat this episode out, while Moe took over the mic for an in-depth…

#109: RAD Podcast Analytics with Stacey Goers from NPR

Feb 26 • 41 min

Do you know something that is really simple? Really Simple Syndication (aka, RSS). Did you know that RSS is the backbone of podcast delivery? Well, aren’t you clever! What’s NOT really simple is effectively measuring podcasts when a key underlying…

#108: Smart Speaker Measurement with Steve Mulder from NPR

Feb 12 • 56 min

“Hey, Google! How do you measure yourself?” “I’m sorry. I can’t answer that question. Would you like to listen to a podcast that can?” National Public Radio has long been on the forefront of the world of audio media. Why, you might even remember…

#107: Bringing Data Science to the Enterprise with Dr. Katie Sasso

Jan 29 • 54 min

What does it really take to bring data science into the enterprise? Or… what does it take to bring it into your part of the enterprise? In this episode, the gang sits down with Dr. Katie Sasso from the Columbus Collaboratory…because…

#106: SQL and the Digital Analyst with Pawel Kapuscinski

Jan 15 • 51 min

WHERE were you the first time you listened to this podcast? Did you feel like you were JOINing a SELECT GROUP BY doing so? Can you COUNT the times you’ve thought to yourself, “Wow. These guys are sometimes really unFILTERed?” On this…

2018 Year in Review!

Jan 1 • 50 min

Happy New Year! Sure. The ball has dropped in Times Square, and a new year means an opportunity to look forward. But, we wanted to take a quick look back first — on the industry, on the podcast, and on the world in general. From GDPR to Bayesian…

#104: Getting the Data Collection Right with Adam Greco

Dec 18, 2018 • 57 min

Have you ever had stakeholders complain that they’re not getting the glorious insights they expect from your analytics program? Have you ever had to deliver the news that the specific data they’re looking for isn’t actually available with the current…

#103: Customer Data Platforms Revisited with Todd Belcher from CDP Resource

Dec 4, 2018 • 53 min

What’s the hot new technology of 2018? AI? Deep Learning? Pole-dancing robots? Maybe. Or, maybe it’s customer data platforms (CDPs) — a topic we actually covered way back in January 2017 on episode #053 with Todd Belcher, who, at the time, was…

#102: Data and Disasters (of the Natural Kind)

Nov 20, 2018 • 55 min

Perspective is a good thing. We’ve all agonized about a misreported metric or an unsatisfying entry page analysis and had to remind ourselves that we’re not exactly saving lives with our work. On this episode, though, the gang actually meanders…

#101: Diving into Data Lakes with Rohan Dhupelia from Atlassian

Nov 6, 2018 • 50 min

Remember when you used to keep all of your data packed into data boxes and stacked up on a bunch of data shelves in your state-of-the-art data warehouse? Well, it might be time to fire up the data forklift and haul all of those boxes out of the…

#100 - Listener Questions Answered!

Oct 23, 2018 • 70 min

To think, it was barely-considered subtle humor that we used two trailing zeros in episode #001. But, despite our best efforts to destroy our reputations or our livers long before we centupled that original episode, we failed on both fronts, and we now…

#099: How Technical Should the Analyst Be? With Simo Ahava!

Oct 9, 2018 • 62 min

Are you deeply knowledgable in JavaScript, R, the DOM, Python, AWS, jQuery, Google Cloud Platform, and SQL? Good for you! If you’re not, should you be? What does “technical” mean, anyway? And, is it even possible for an analyst to dive into all of…

#098: Successfully Managing the Analyst

Sep 25, 2018 • 57 min

As the axiom goes: people don’t leave companies; they leave their managers. And, good analysts are constantly being approached with new opportunities. So, what’s the secret formula for hanging on to analytics talent? Assuming simply chaining them…

#097: Spotting and Assessing Analytics Talent with Simon Rumble

Sep 11, 2018 • 54 min

Tell me about a time you produced an amazing analysis. Please provide your response in the form of a Jupyter notebook that uses Python or R (or both!) to pull words from a corpus that contains all words in the OED stored in a BigQuery table. I mean,…

#096: Analyzing Online Learning Options for the Analyst with Lizzie Allen-Klein

Aug 28, 2018 • 58 min

Mama always said: life is like a box of chocolates, and online learning is sometimes like one of those boxes where you don’t know which piece is delicious nougat and which piece is some sort of nasty, coconut-y cream. Well, maybe not your mama. But,…

(Bonus) 1:1 with Jodi Daniels: GDPR and CCPA (Privacy!) Updates

Aug 21, 2018 • 13 min

For this mini-episode, Tim sits down (virtually) with Episode #077 guest Jodi Daniels from Red Clover Advisors to chat about the world of privacy post-May 25, 2018 (GDPR), as well as the upcoming California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018 (CCPA). Has the…

#095: The Rise of BI with Taylor Udell

Aug 14, 2018 • 54 min

Business Intelligence. It’s a term that’s been around for a few decades, but that is every bit as difficult to nail down as “data science,” “big data,” or a jellyfish. Think too hard about it, and you might actually find yourself…

#094: Scaling a Culture of Experimentation with Andrea Burbank from Pinterest

Jul 31, 2018 • 51 min

The company: “Hey, you. That’s a mighty nice test you’ve run. We should be doing that a lot more of those.” You: “Um…okay. But, I’m only one person.” In this episode, the gang chats with Pinterest’s Andrea Burbank (Twitter | Pinterest) about how she…

#093: The Proclivities and Personal Perspectives of the Analyst

Jul 17, 2018 • 51 min

Humans are creatures of habit. And analysts — those of us who haven’t been so drawn into the world of artificial intelligence that we have become cyborgs, at least — are humans. In this episode, the gang explores the good and the bad side of…

#092: A Special Report - Data Journalism Meets Business Analytics with Walt Hickey

Jul 3, 2018 • 49 min

Once upon a time, there was some data. And that data cried out to be extracted and analyzed and packaged up like the most exquisite of gifts and then presented gloriously to an eager and excited group of stakeholders. But, alas! Will this data story…

#091: Data Literacy and (at!) MEE!

Jun 19, 2018 • 37 min

Are you reading this? If so, then you are literate. But, are you (and are your stakeholders) data literate? What does that even mean? On this episode — recorded in front of a live audience at Marketing Evolution Experience in Las Vegas —…

(Bonus) 1:1 with Michele Kiss: Finding Time to Learn Stuff (like BigQuery)

Jun 12, 2018 • 11 min

Under the ‘guise of a discussion about making the leap into a new technology, this bonus mini-episode (hopefully) clears up the on-going confusion about the Kiss Sisters. Moe sat down with her big sister, Michele, to chat about jumping into learning…

#090: A New Paradigm for Privacy with Sergio Maldonado

Jun 5, 2018 • 65 min

Put this in your pipe and smoke it: all of the tracking we try to do of people is actually technology designed to track content. And, even that tracking of content was a hacked-together repurposing of a system designed…

#089: Bringing Statistics to Digital Analytics Data with Matt Policastro

May 22, 2018 • 58 min

Regression. Correlation. Normality. t-tests. Falsities of both the positive and negative varieties. How do these terms and techniques play nicely with digital analytics data? Are they the schoolyard bullies wielded by data scientists, destined to…

#088: User Research Meets Analytics with Els Aerts

May 8, 2018 • 47 min

Thanks for stopping by. Please get comfortable. We’re going to be taking a few notes while you listen, but pay that no mind. Now, what we’d like you to do is listen to the podcast. Oh. And don’t worry about that big mirror over there. There may be 2…

(Bonus) 1:1 with Chad Sanderson: The Pitfalls of A/B Testing

May 1, 2018 • 13 min

Bayesian vs. Frequentist. False Positive vs. False Negative. Truth vs. Uncertainty. It’s the world of A/B testing! In this bonus mini-episode, Moe sat down with Chad Sanderson from Subway to discuss some of the pitfalls of A/B testing — the nuances…

#087: Offline Data in an Online World with James Fogelberg

Apr 24, 2018 • 58 min

If you have a smartphone nearby and you are not wearing a foil hat, chances are that some brand somewhere — and probably several brands in many places — know where you are. Is that creepy? Maybe. It’s likely removing a few taps when you check what…

#086: Avoiding Analytics Rabbit Holes

Apr 10, 2018 • 49 min

Have you ever walked out of a meeting with a clear idea of the analysis that you’re going to conduct, only to find yourself three days later staring at an endless ocean of crunched data and wondering in which direction you’re supposed to be paddling…

(Bonus) 1:1 with Krista Seiden: Growth Marketing

Apr 3, 2018 • 10 min

That’s right. We’re trying to grow the reach of this podcast, so we figured we needed to do some growth h—-…NO! No. No. NO!!! We’re NOT going to use that term. But, it turns out that growth marketing has some interesting concepts. On the one hand,…

(Bonus) Hot Takes from Adobe Summit 2018 with Michael and Tim

Mar 29, 2018 • 11 min

Michael, Tim, and 12,998 of their closest friends descended on Las Vegas for Adobe Summit the last week of March. With luck, Tim will have worked through the after-effects of the sensory overload of Vegas combined with the sensory overload of Adobe…

#085: Moving Beyond Microsoft Excel

Mar 27, 2018 • 57 min

Some people (possibly even one of the co-hosts of this podcast…on this very episode) have been known to say, “People have this dependency on Excel, which is freakin’ weird!” We know it wasn’t Tim, because he wouldn’t have filtered his language!…

#084: Bayesian Statistics and the Digital Analyst with Dr. Elea Feit

Mar 13, 2018 • 64 min

Do you model professionally? Would you like to? Or, are you uncertain. These are the topics of this episode: Bayesian statistician (among other official roles that are way less fun to say) Dr. Elea Feit joined the gang to discuss how we, as…

(Bonus) 1:1 with Aurélie Pols: Privacy and GDPR

Mar 6, 2018 • 10 min

Moe sat down for a chat with privacy and GDPR expert Aurélie Pols to dive in to some of the questions that, at times, get treated as peripheral in the run-up to new regulations, but that seem like they are fairly fundamental when it comes to…

#083: KPIs in the Absence of a Clear Conversion with Amy Sample

Feb 27, 2018 • 48 min

Raise your hand if you work for a company that sells exclusively low-consideration products and only sells them online. Anyone? Anyone? We only see a couple of hands out there. For all the rest of you, this episode might be of interest. We sat down…

#082: Superweek 2018 - GDPR, Machine Learning, and Tim’s Hair

Feb 13, 2018 • 53 min

For the second year in a row for the podcast — but the first appearance since Moe joined the crew — we headed to the Hunguest Grandhotel Galya outside Budapest for Superweek, one of the most unique conference experiences in the digital analytics…

(Bonus) 1:1 with Lee Isensee: The Measure Slack Team

Feb 6, 2018 • 22 min

In this, our initial bonus audio, Tim sits down with Lee Isensee, creator and curator of the Measure Slack team. We plug the Slack team on every episode of the podcast, and all three co-hosts are active members of the team, so we wanted to find out a…

#081: The Career Growth Conundrum: Lead People or Crunch Data?

Jan 30, 2018 • 54 min

You love analytics. Great. You even love your job (hopefully)! But, you’re thinking about the future, and it looks like there is a fork in the road. Should you take the path that leads you down the people management path? Or, should you take the path…

#080: Making Sh** Happen with Evan LaPointe

Jan 16, 2018 • 55 min

Do you ever feel like you’ve got the analytics blues because you see what needs to happen, and it’s something innovative, and all the signals say it’s the right thing to do… but the realities of organizational life are a brick wall on the path…

#079: When the Stakeholder Just. Doesn’t. Get It! with Rusty Rahmer

Jan 2, 2018 • 61 min

Happy new year! Nothing says a new year like a new year’s resolution. And, what’s a better professional resolution than to work with stakeholders more effectively? Unfortunately, we’ve all come across business users who have no interest in the data,…

#078: 2017 - The Year in Review

Dec 19, 2017 • 47 min

2017 was a big year for both the digital analytics industry and for the Digital Analytics Power Hour. Join us, won’t you, as we (figuratively!) gaze upon our navels? From the traction the #womeninanalytics movement gained on multiple fronts, to the…

#077: Lions and GDPR and Bears, Oh My! with Jodi Daniels

Dec 5, 2017 • 54 min

Are you a data subject? If you’re a person, then you better believe you are! And, so is every person who visits your website. And, if you are in the EU, or you have visitors from the EU, then May 25th, 2018, is a day you should be keeping a close eye…

#076: Insights, Please. Actionable Ones!

Nov 21, 2017 • 56 min

When you find a true insight, it can make your head spin. But, will your head spin in a different direction if the insight is found in Australia than if it is found in the United States? On this episode, Rod Jacka from Panalysis joins the crew for a…

#075: Corralling the Cross-Device Visitor

Nov 7, 2017 • 47 min

It’s a challenge as old as the smartphone (or…technically… a little bit older): we want to track and know people, but, when they’re visiting us from their phone, their tablet, their work laptop, and their home desktop, we often really just…

#074: The Google Cloud Platform with Mark Edmondson

Oct 24, 2017 • 64 min

You’re listening to this podcast, so you’re, obviously, well-attuned to the cutting edge of all things digital. But, in this episode, we’re going to discuss a couple (or countless) products/platforms (PaaS — Platforms as a Service! Who knew…

#073: When the Analyst Goes Independent with Adam Ribaudo

Oct 10, 2017 • 62 min

Do you have a spare shingle lying around? Have you been thinking about painting, “Analyst for Hire - Will Work for Cookies” on it and hanging it up on your front door? It seems like a lot of analysts are pondering whether the next company they should…

#072: The Future Digital Analyst Redux with Corry Prohens

Sep 26, 2017 • 52 min

Have you learned R yet? No? Well, then Tim is disappointed in you. Or, maybe that’s totally okay! Way back on episode #035, we asked the question if data science was the future of digital analytics. We concluded…maybe…for some. On this episode, we…

#071: Reinforcement Learning with Matt Gershoff

Sep 12, 2017 • 58 min

Let’s pretend your goal as an analyst is to eloquently and accurately explain reinforcement learning. Now, let’s pretend that you get to try that explanation again and again, and we’ll give you an electric shock every time you state something…

#70: The Case for Customer Lifetime Value with Dr. Peter Fader

Aug 29, 2017 • 60 min

Is your organization customer-centric? Does your product team dive into the demographics of your customers to figure out what features will make them as happy as possible? If so, then you’re doing it all wrong! Perhaps. On this episode, the gang chats…

#069: The Bias of the Analyst

Aug 15, 2017 • 55 min

Are you biased? Either you answered, “Yes,” or you’re in denial. Or you’re an AI, in which case you should just go and start your own podcast instead of listening to this one. UNLESS your prediction algorithms told you that this would be the…

#068 - Engaging with Your Local Analytics Community

Aug 1, 2017 • 48 min

The conceit of this podcast is having real analysts hang out with each other — enjoying each other’s company and talking a little shop. But, for you, dear listener, that hanging out is occurring through your earbuds. What does it take to hang out IRL…

#067 - R You Considering Python? (With Ryan Praskievicz)

Jul 18, 2017 • 51 min

WHY does Tim simply not give Python its due? Isn’t Python a perfectly acceptable — possibly even better — option when it comes to diving into programming with data? It’s open source, too. Some say it’s easier to learn than R. And, frankly, isn’t a…

#066: The Democratization of the Data

Jul 4, 2017 • 48 min

It’s another one of those on-going lobby bar topics: how much of the data should be made available to whom and in what form? Should all of an organization’s data be completely and freely available to everyone in the company, or is that a recipe…

#065 - Digital Analytics from a Psychological Perspective with Dr. Liraz Margalit

Jun 20, 2017 • 54 min

We can watch (sort of) what users do on our sites. That’s web analytics. We can ask them how they felt about the experience. That’s voice of the customer. But, can we (and should we?) actually analyze their emotional reactions? On this episode,…

#064: Analog (In-Store) Analytics with Gary Angel

Jun 6, 2017 • 57 min

Back in the day, we explained the difference between a visitor, a visit, and a pageview to stakeholders using an analogy of a person walking into a physical store. Now, digital channels are dominating, and physical stores are struggling…which is an…

#063: The Trials and Tribulations of Tool Transitions

May 23, 2017 • 40 min

Change. It’s scary. It’s exhilarating. It’s a song by Churchill. Sometimes, be it due to your manager, due to a corporate acquisition, or due to a job change, you just wind up with a voice in your head belting out, “You want me to change, change,…

#062: When and Where Does the Role of the Analyst End?

May 9, 2017 • 49 min

It seems like a simple couple of questions: 1) When and where does the analyst’s role start?, and 2) When and where does the analyst’s role end? And, do the answers to either of these questions change based on the type of organization…

#061: Selling the Value of Analytics with Sayf Sharif

Apr 25, 2017 • 54 min

“Psssst! Hey! Buddy! Want some analytics? Whatcha’ lookin’’for? Insights? Recommendations? Maybe some implementation? I got anything you want, and I got it at a great price!…” Sound familiar? No? Well, then you’re just not hanging out in dark…

#060: The People and Personality Side of Analytics

Apr 11, 2017 • 55 min

Do you want to know something about analysts? They’re people. And, not only are they people, but they work with people. And people have personalities. Even the hosts of this podcast have personalities. One of the hosts is introspective about the…

#059: Display Ads and Ad Fraud with John Nardone

Mar 28, 2017 • 46 min

Well into our third year of the show, we decided it was time to show that we’ve become hard-hitting audio journalists by bringing on a heavy-hitter in the world of display media and grilling him with tough questions. And then we found out we’re…

#058: Analytics in an Agile Organization with Simo Ahava

Mar 14, 2017 • 62 min

FINALLY! It’s a show all about Google Tag Manager! Oh. Wait. What’s that? We had Simo Ahava on the show and actually covered a different topic entirely? WHAT NINNYHEAD APPROVED THAT DECISION?! Well, what’s done is done. With ‘nary a trigger or a…

#057: Open Data with Brett Hurt and Jon Loyens

Feb 28, 2017 • 73 min

So, knowledge management and data management walked into a bar and bumped into Github. The result? Open data and, specifically, data.world! Coremetrics…and then Bazaarvoice founder Brett Hurt, along with Homeaway.com and Bazaarvoice veteran Jon…

#056: Live from Superweek!

Feb 14, 2017 • 41 min

Have you ever been to a really great analytics conference and had just one great conversation after another with other attendees? We have! And, for this episode, we decided to head up into the hills above Budapest and try to bring that experience to…

#055: Systems Thinking with Christopher Berry

Jan 31, 2017 • 50 min

The world is an oyster. It’s also a system. A complex system! Companies are components in that system, and they’re systems unto themselves! And marketing departments, and digital marketing, and the data therein, are systems, too. As analysts, we’re…

#054: Pop Analytics with Kevin Hillstrom

Jan 17, 2017 • 57 min

Pop psychology is fun, if not that useful. Pop analytics can be dangerous! What IS pop analytics? It’s a term coined (as far as we can tell) by analytics legend Kevin Hillstrom, and we managed to get him on the show to chat about it! The fact that it…

#053: Customer Data Platforms with Todd Belcher

Jan 3, 2017 • 50 min

Do you care about acquiring customers? Do you care about data? Do you like wearing shoes that have soles that are 2-3″ thick? Put those three things together and it means you care — or should care — about customer data platforms. On this…

#052: The Year in Review - 2016

Dec 20, 2016 • 47 min

2016 is almost in the books! In just over a week, we’ll be ringing in the new year, and we have it on Very Good Authority that 2017 will be the Year of Mobile. But, this episode is as much about looking back as it is about looking forward —…

#051: The 1-Person Digital Analytics Team with Moe Kiss

Dec 6, 2016 • 54 min

Have you ever seen a one-man show in the theater? It’s awesome. Unless it’s terrible. The same can be said for one-person digital analytics teams. It can be awesome, in that you get to, literally, do EVERY aspect of analytics. It can be terrible…

#050: Internal Analytics Organizational Structures

Nov 22, 2016 • 47 min

Step right up! Step right up! We’ve got your org charts here! If an analyst falls in the woods, and she reports into a hub-and-spoke model, is the result best illustrated with a 3D pie chart? Join Michael and Tim as they conclude that, at the end of…

#049: The Future of Tag Management

Nov 8, 2016 • 58 min

If you’re in the U.S., happy election day! In the spirit of the mayhem and controversy that the political process brings, we’re tackling a topic that is every bit as controversial: tag management. Does Adobe DTM gratuitously delete emails? Has GTM…

#048: Social Media Analytics with Hayes Davis

Oct 25, 2016 • 50 min

You know what season it is? Well, in the United States, we’re closing out a 4-year, never-ending cycle of electing a president. The tweets are getting tweeted and retweeted, the Facebook posts are getting posted and reacted to, and the video! Oh, the…

#047: Assessing Analytics Job Descriptions

Oct 11, 2016 • 53 min

Have you ever read an analytics job description? Have you found yourself wondering, “Is it just me, or is there something fishy going on here?” Who better to verbally cogitate this question writ large than a couple of guys who haven’t actually applied…

#046: Measuring Podcasts at NPR with Steve Mulder

Sep 27, 2016 • 50 min

Do you listen to podcasts? Well, of course you do! Are you working in or involved with analytics? If you listen to this podcast, you almost certainly are! Where do those two interests intersect? On this episode! Steve Mulder, Senior Director of…

#045: Identifying and Prioritizing Hypotheses

Sep 13, 2016 • 58 min

The intro bumper for this podcast says “the occasional guest,” and, yet, the last five episodes have had guests. That’s hardly “occasional,” so Tim and Michael had a choice: either change the intro or do an episode on a topic for which both of them…

#044: Artificial Intelligence with Dennis Mortensen

Aug 30, 2016 • 57 min

The machines are coming! The machines are coming! Artifiicial Intelligence is here. But what is it, and how long will we have to wait for the technology to completely take over all analysis work? Dennis Mortensen — founder of x.ai — joins us on this…

#043: Open Source Analytics with Simon Rumble

Aug 16, 2016 • 54 min

Somebody wants to overthink their analytics tools? Tell ‘em their dreamin’! We wanted to talk about open source and event analytics and Snowplow sits right at that intersection. Our guest Simon Rumble is the co-founder of Snowflake Analytics and one…

#042: Data Storytelling with Brent Dykes

Aug 2, 2016 • 43 min

Once upon a time, in an industry near and dear, lived an analyst. And that analyst needed to present the results of her analysis to a big, scary, business user. This is not a tale for the faint of heart, dear listener. We’re talking the Brothers Grimm…

#041: The Productization of Customer Intelligence with Blair Reeves

Jul 19, 2016 • 56 min

What IS customer intelligence? What is a customer? Is the customer best understood by breaking the word down into its component parts: “cuss” and “tumor?” Would that be an intelligent thing to do? Will these and related questions some day be answered…

#040: Google BigQuery with Michael Healy

Jul 5, 2016 • 47 min

In this episode, we dive deep on a 1988 classic: Tom Hanks, under the direction of Penny Marshall, was a 12-year-old in a 30-year-old’s body… Actually, that’s a different “Big” from what we actually cover in this episode. In this instant classic,…

#039: In Defense of Excel

Jun 21, 2016 • 39 min

As Dr. Phil says, “Never put more into a relationship than you can afford to lose.” Not sure what that has to do with Excel but it sounds vaguely wise, which is the whole point. Tim and Michael try to be your relationship coach for Microsoft Excel….

#038: To Outsource or Not Outsource — That Is the Question

Jun 7, 2016 • 43 min

To outsource or not to outsource — that is the question: Whether ‘tis more efficient to tap The skills and talents of those who bill by the hour, Or to bring resources inside as full-time staff, And, by doing so, manage them. To contract, to…

#037: Growing Your Career without Changing Companies

May 24, 2016 • 48 min

If you’re like most analysts, you’ve probably changed jobs since the last episode of this podcast hit your earbuds two weeks ago. Or, if you haven’t actually changed jobs, then you’ve at least been hounded by recruiters who wish you would. No…

#036: Attribution Revisited with Jim Novo

May 10, 2016 • 51 min

Back by popular demand: attribution! This time, we brought in an adult on the subject: Jim Novo of The Drilling Down Project. A lot of questions get tackled in this episode: Should “gut feel” ever trump “the data?” Which is a better analogy for…

#035: Is Data Science the Future of Web Analytics?

Apr 26, 2016 • 47 min

Are you a data scientist? Have you pondered whether you’re really a growth hacker? Well…get over yourself! Picking up on a debate that started onstage at eMetrics, Michael, Jim, and Tim discuss whether a fundamental shift in the role (and requisite…

#034: Live from eMetrics…it’s the Digital Analytics Power Hour!

Apr 12, 2016 • 44 min

I know what you’re thinking: they’re world-class podcasters when they hide behind editing tools and autotune, but can they do it LIVE? This special recording from the final keynote spot at eMetrics has the three amigos of insight taking questions from…

#033: Winning with Analytics

Mar 29, 2016 • 39 min

You know what it’s time we do? It’s time we make analytics great again. How can we do that? With three guys who know about winning. Maybe not winning with real estate. Or with steaks. But winning with analytics. Are these three guys winners? Well, for…

#032: Questions and Answers with Tom Miller

Mar 15, 2016 • 42 min

What is life but a series of questions? Does that question even make any sense? We’ll never know, as this wasn’t a question that got asked on this episode. Instead, Tom Miller, co-host of the Measured Direction podcast, joined us to give us a taste of…

#031: Personalization: The OTHER Faustian Bargain

Mar 1, 2016 • 52 min

We’ve got the technology. We’ve got the behavioral data. We’ve got the content (or at least tell ourselves we do). We’re all set to develop personalized experiences that knock consumers socks off and leave them begging us to take their money. Is it…

#030: 2016 Predictions for Digital Analytics

Feb 16, 2016 • 46 min

As an analyst, it’s never a good idea to make predictions without data. With that said, for our first predictions episode, we’ve chosen to make some big and small predictions for the digital analytics space for the remainder of 2016 — using only…

#029: (Reflections on) The History of Digital Analytics with Jim Sterne

Feb 2, 2016 • 51 min

Philosopher, poet, and essayist George Santayana wrote, ”Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” We thought we’d have him on to reflect about the history of digital analytics…but he died in 1952. Ambrose Bierce…

#028 Attribution!

Jan 19, 2016 • 44 min

Attribution is like a box of chocolates. It can be really expensive, or it can be really cheap. It requires making a lot of decisions as to how you actually want to consume it. It may leave you feeling ill! Join the guys for a 45-minute walk across…

#027: Digital Transformation with Gary Angel

Jan 5, 2016 • 58 min

What better time to ask Big Questions about analytics than the start of a new year? In this episode, Gary Angel from EY joins us to talk just a little bit about his new book, and to talk a lot about digital transformation: what it means, what’s…

#026: The Power Hour Year in Review

Dec 22, 2015 • 44 min

One year of shows. It was our initial Big Hairy Audacious Goal, and we did it. We hoped you had as much fun this year listening as we did recording, and we’d like to take a chance to reflect. Did we hit our initial KPIs (because of course we had…

#025: A/B Testing with Kelly Wortham from EY

Dec 8, 2015 • 45 min

We had a hypothesis that our listeners might be interested in hearing an expert on digital optimization. In this episode we test that hypothesis. Listen and learn as Kelly Wortham from EY runs circles around the lads, and brings them to an…

#024: Women in Digital Analytics with Krista Seiden

Nov 24, 2015 • 45 min

Have you noticed that neither Michael, Jim, nor Tim are women? They did! But that didn’t stop them from taking on the subject of women in digital analytics (with diversions into the subjects of women and scotch, and women in professional poker)….

#023: A European View of Analytics with Matthias Bettag

Nov 10, 2015 • 46 min

From a sophisticated analysis of the names and timestamps of many of our commenters, we discovered something that surprised us: digital analytics is a profession that is practiced outside of North America! This fact blew our minds, but ,curious…

#022: Wearables, Measurement, and Monetization, Oh My! with David McBride

Oct 27, 2015 • 50 min

It’s hard enough keeping up with the times when digital analytics is exclusively Desktop/Mobile/Tablet devices. Now, what if we had to work with data that came from everything? Join us this episode where we lean heavily on the wisdom and experience of…

#021: Analytics in Sports with Ben Gaines

Oct 13, 2015 • 37 min

In this episode, we’ve simulated a lobby bar at the end of Adobe Summit, with Ben Gaines dropping by and everyone temporarily tapped out on talk of eVars, s.Props, derived metrics, and classifications for a bit. The result? A conversation that quickly…

#020: Can Data Curtail Culture and Creativity? A Corporate Conundrum!

Sep 29, 2015 • 38 min

Sometimes…well…MOST times…a lobby bar conversation starts on one topic and ends up somewhere entirely different. In this episode, our intrepid trio initially tackles the relationship between data and corporate creativity, and then veers off into…

#019: R U Curious About R?

Sep 15, 2015 • 41 min

In honor of Talk Like a Pirate Day (and by popular demand), we donned our eyepatches, poured ourselves a few tankards of grog, and commandeered the wisdom of Eric Goldsmith from TED (maybe you’ve seen one or two of their videos?) to explore the whats,…

#018: Analytics Advice for the Recent Grad

Sep 1, 2015 • 42 min

Have you been listening to the three of us and thinking “Man, if those guys can be digital analysts, ANYONE can?” You’re not alone! In this week’s episode, we share some tips and tricks for how to get started in the digital analytics space. We also…

#017: Data Visualization and Communication with Lea Pica

Aug 18, 2015 • 45 min

They say a picture is worth a thousand terabytes of data (probably). If you are a regular listener of the podcast, you will know proper communication isn’t our strongest suit, so we brought in a hitter. Lea Pica joins us in this episode to talk about…

#016: Digital Analytics Without a Clear Online Conversion

Aug 4, 2015 • 38 min

It’s a nasty rumor, but we heard that there are a couple of domains out there on the interwebs that are not pure play eCommerce or online lead gen sites. Why, there are government sites and nonprofit sites and CPG sites and academic institution sites…

#015: Digital Analyst Skills vs Talents

Jul 21, 2015 • 43 min

Scads has been written about the distinction between skills and talents. But, how does that distinction apply to digital analysts? In this episode, Jim and Tim actually find something they agree on…at least briefly. And Michael maneuvers Tim into at…

#014: Mobile Measurement with Lee Isensee

Jul 7, 2015 • 39 min

It’s not only the year of mobile…AGAIN, but it’s the year of mobile measurement! While our intrepid hosts have all tagged an app or two in their day, they thought it would be entertaining to be joined by someone meek, unopinionated, and…

#013: Musings on the Measurement of Display Media

Jun 23, 2015 • 34 min

Can the media analyst and the web analyst get along? Can the chasm between clicks and visits every be crossed? Is attribution management the silver bullet that will, once and for all, accurately assign a value to banner ads? What the hell is Vizu? Can…

#012: The Governance of the Data

Jun 9, 2015 • 44 min

Most people find the concept of governance about as interesting as an afternoon of quality control work at the beige paint factory. If you agree with this sentiment and are listening to this week’s podcast, we hope to change your mind! With special…

#011: These Are a Few of Our Favorite Insights

May 26, 2015 • 39 min

Sure I like your theory guys, but I want to hear some stories from the trenches! Episode 11 is all about the anecdotes, with the guys sharing stories about work they’ve done as analysts that had the most impact. Whether from hard work or a moment of…

#010: Reviewing the Latest CMOsurvey.org Survey Results

May 12, 2015 • 34 min

Want to hear Jim Cain wing it for 40 minutes as he discusses a survey he never read? Interested in hearing Tim Wilson boil with incandescent rage as Jim triggers the Indiana Jones style pressure pads under his overpriced hotel snacks? Then this is the…

#009: Working with Business Stakeholders

Apr 28, 2015 • 37 min

If a report falls in the forest, and no one is there to read it, will it still lead to business improvements? Prepare for many more broken metaphors, super hero references and a surprising defense of the HiPPO in this week’s Power Hour. Make sure to…

#008: Building an Analytics Team

Apr 14, 2015 • 40 min

Building your chops as an analyst is hard enough. Building an analyst team is even harder. In this episode, the three amigos of measurment share best practices in HR, Training, Management and Planning to help you in growing your own team. This episode…

#007: How Can Analysts Effectively Build Out Their Technical Chops?

Mar 31, 2015 • 38 min

Digital analysts crunch numbers, sure. But, in order to crunch those numbers in a meaningful way, they have to truly understand how, when, and where the data gets captured in the first place. In this listener-requested episode, the guys are joined by…

#006: What Is the Space for Tools that Aren’t Google Analytics or Adobe Analytics

Mar 17, 2015 • 48 min

Fifteen years ago, digital analytics tooling was pretty straightforward (something that looks at log files). In 2015, there are literally hundreds of tools that can be used to measure every aspect of a digital sales and marketing ecosystem. Most…

#005: Big Data — What an Executive Needs to Know

Mar 3, 2015 • 40 min

The power of big data is a curious thing, Make a one man weep, make another man sing. Change a hawk to a little white dove. More than a feeling that’s the power of big data. As always, Huey Lewis hits the nail on the head with this complex topic. What…

#004: As an Analyst, When Is It Time to Move On?

Feb 17, 2015 • 50 min

What’s good at math and has more suitors than Taylor Swift? A digital analyst. There’s an unprecedented number of available jobs, along with aggressive recruiters, higher salaries, and better titles. When should a digital analyst choose to…

#003: Taming the Digital Analytics Technology Stack

Feb 3, 2015 • 43 min

To win at digital measurement in 2015, you need more data capture tools than just your web analytics tool of record. In episode 3, the 3 musketeers of measurement try to outline what they feel the core tools are that any digital analyst should be…

#002: What is a Dashboard?

Jan 20, 2015 • 39 min

Episode 002 finds Michael, Tim and Jim tackling one of the most important, powerful and sometimes frustrating deliverables to any business analyst: the dashboard. What exactly is a dashboard? What are they for? What should they accomplish? Why can’t…

#001: Becoming a Better Digital Analyst

Jan 2, 2015 • 38 min

In this inaugural episode of the Digital Analytics Power Hour, Michael, Jim, and Tim discuss how a digital analyst working today can become better at what he or she does. Tending bar? Cold calling the CFO? The guys share their own origin stories…