Metrics, numbers, charts—they feel so solid. Easy to focus on metrics, because they make you feel like you’re measuring something real. Marketers look at these because the executives want them! However, what if chasing those numbers is actually leading you to the wrong answer? What if the most important things just aren’t captured in a spreadsheet? Now, how to find the appropriate answers? And is there even an answer?
Basing Decisions on Incomplete Data
There’s something so tempting about relying on data. Website clicks go up? Clearly, things are working! But maybe those extra clicks are from bots. More followers on social media? Feels good, unless most of them are fake accounts from like, another country that don’t care about what you do. The metrics don’t indicate if the product resonates with a wider group.
The point is that every metric tells only a tiny piece of the overall story. Relying on metrics alone can often be misguided because they can miss a lot of context that can indicate success, such as whether a product will be successful. It is important always to view context, and if something worked well last year, is it still worth spending money this year?
Connecting With Actual People
Okay, so what should businesses trust more? It is more important to connect with the actual people using your product. Find ways to hear directly from them and avoid basing decisions solely on a graph. Talking to the actual people who want to buy things is important.
This means doing actual customer interviews or surveys. Ask people what they like, what they hate, what makes them keep buying, or what makes them stop buying. Read reviews carefully and not just the number of stars, but their comments. You need to see trends and problems show up again and again; that can be trusted way more than general numbers. This requires significant more work as people tend to only want to be heard when they have bad experiences that make this qualitative feedback challenging.
Paying Attention To Signals
What are examples of “signals?” Startups look for indicators when they are doing well. If someone signs up for a service, watches 1 episode, and cancels the subscription, those numbers go up, but that is not good. The “real” data will come from when the person likes every episode and recommends it to a friend.
Think about other signals. A lot of musicians want more people to listen to their music. Music producers will want to buy Spotify followers to demonstrate popularity, but in reality, a huge number of their followers are bots. An extra reliable signal is if people start to listen and save songs for later, because that is organic, and probably a good sign. It might be more worthwhile to focus on real listeners than artificial ones through SpotifyStorm.
Adapting Based On Learning
None is helpful if you don’t evolve and make suitable changes. Hearing feedback and getting indicators is only half the battle. A business needs to use that to change how they do things.
If the customer keeps mentioning that the instructions are not well organized, rewrite them! If they constantly say they don’t like a certain feature, think about pulling back or making it optional. This is real-time results; people appreciate that by listening to them, listening to the actual people who use the product will do more than any type of quantitative data. By fixing problems and improving the service or product, it’s a sure sign that the business cares.
Finding Undiscovered Opportunities
It’s good when people directly make complaints, but the other times, there may be unspoken opportunities to make the service better. Sometimes, the customer won’t mention anything at all, so how can their opinions be taken into consideration? Look at when people quit buying the products or services; what did they switch to instead? Try to talk to them and learn why. If a product is working, maybe there is a feature being missed by not including it. By staying alert, it may be possible to find hidden opportunities to win and keep customers at higher retention rates. This type of awareness can be more valuable than looking at all the numbers of what is happening right now.
Conclusion
In the time of data overload, it’s a trap to only trust the facts on the spreadsheets. Metrics are good when the whole story is reviewed. By focusing on actual feedback of the users and being able to adapt when there are troubles, and listening to the needs of those willing to spend money, the business owners will do a better job. In the end, it benefits both sides.
Prime Star 
Luys Parker