Paralysis from analysis
Data analysis is not enough by itself if egaming companies lose sight of what motivates and drives the customer, argues Kim Lund of Infiniteedgegaming.com.
A couple of days ago Mike Fisher from Indicia wrote a piece here that I really liked. I ended up making a comment on it that almost exceeded the length of the article itself; so I was kindly asked to rephrase it into a post of my own.
That I enjoyed Mike’s piece will not come as a surprise to anyone who follows my blog. The first half of Mike’s post is spot on. What I may “disagree” with however (I’m not sure Mike disagrees with what I am about to say), is the post’s focus on using data analysis to learn about customers and what they are ultimately looking for.
On the contrary, I’d be willing to claim that, at times, egaming companies’ access to so much customer and activity data has impeded their understanding of players and their wants. The industry is prone to being enslaved by its own data and thus has forgotten how to think without it. And this results in analysis paralysis. Sometimes, obviously.
The idea that you can understand your customers by watching them from a distance and prodding them with A/B multivariate testing experiments and a bit of Excel spreadsheet magic is foreign to me. Almost counterintuitive even.
As with any science experiment, it is not much use prodding anything unless you have a theory of what you think the result will be and why. Data analysis is an important pillar in formulating such theories and data analysis is a priceless tool to help verify them, but understanding game theory and gambling psychology, doing proper competitor analysis and profiling your target customer beyond their gaming activities is far more important if you want to learn your customers, figure out what makes them tick and thus stay ahead of the game.
I say all of this because I’ve seen and heard about too many ideas and potential greenfield ventures being canned because companies have become data analysis junkies.
“If it can’t be measured or if the numbers say otherwise, we can’t do it”. Or “We can do it; we just need to analyse it for six months first.”
Trying to think outside the box in such an environment is frustrating to say the least.
My intention is not to degrade the value of data analysis and business intelligence. I have seen what it can do within my own field of online poker if placed in the right hands. It’s helped tremendously in making discoveries about player behaviour and business efficiency. But almost always on the back of a firm idea of what to look for and why.
Summary. You need to get under the skin of your customers. Egaming customers are complex individuals driven by all sorts of conflicting motivations, ambitions and drives. Data analysis can help you do it. But if you don’t figure out where to cut first, it can get messy.