It’s All About Data

By Bill Mickey
Monday, March 30, 2009

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Between the swell of strategic interest in data that supports the rapidly growing lead-gen tactics in our market, a sudden interest in analytical data from ad agency types, and a growing number of consumer marketers and circulators who are—finally—overseeing the merger of Web and print analytics, it’s a good time to call your attention to, yes, data.

The dots connected when I attended MPA’s digital conference, Magazines 24/7, in March and was pleasantly surprised to see agency folks, one after the other, push the importance of data. And they weren’t talking about your standard MRI and print subscriber data. They were talking about data that comes from user behavior online and how it must be used to supplement ‘traditional’ data and better inform business development.

“Data is the new creative,” said Razorfish’s Domenic Venuto at the event, pointing out that databases, customer behavior metrics and merging online and offline data can certainly help digital sales, but, importantly, also form the bedrock for better subscription sales, new product launches and overall customer experience.

And you’ll recall we interviewed Time Inc.’s Kim Miller in the March issue, a consumer marketer who not only analyzes and vets online data to help the editorial team adjust their content according to consumer interest, she also provides the same function for the ad sales teams.

Finally, at our sister publication’s Folio: Growth Summit also held in March, keynoter and IDG CEO Bob Carrigan outlined how customer behavior data supports his company’s core lead-generation revenue strategy to such a degree it made me think that if the FCC ever imposed aggressive online privacy regulations, the impact on our industry would be catastrophic. That probably won’t happen, but it underscores how crucial behavioral targeting and lead-gen data are in a strategy that’s taken an especially big foothold in b-to-b publishing.

Bill Mickey