Note: This entry originally ran in Wired’s Innovation Insights site on March 24.
I just spent over 18 months researching and writing The Digital Media Metrics Field Guide. My previous books on online advertising and social listening took about seven months each. That’s nearly one extra year of life devoted to figuring metrics out.
It wasn’t easy. I needed every extra day.
Like you, I had to choose which metrics to cover from an ever-expanding and bewildering supply. I settled on those that most readers would come across in the course of a day. And, like you, I had very basic questions about each one that needed answering if they were to be helpful, used wisely and illuminated the impact our brands’ campaigns and digital efforts were having.
The Field Guide details 197 metrics, summarizes over 150 studies, and presents 12 expert points of view on measurement’s present and future. From all that I learned a lot about what thou shall do, and, perhaps more importantly, what thou shalt not do.
Because it’s more fun to talk about what not to do, let’s talk about the cardinal sin of digital measurement: coveting thy vendor’s measures. Continue reading “The Cardinal Sin of Digital Measurement”