Asking Your Opinion on Storefront Social Media and Loyalty Programs
By Tim Berry
Are you a store owner in the U.S.? Do you know one? I want your opinion on a few things. I’m working up some data on small stores and payment plans and local loyalty programs for some friends of mine. As part of that, I’ve worked up a quick and easy survey — only 10... Read More »
Franchise King Echoes Mark Twain on Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics
By Tim Berry
What I really like about Franchise King Joel Libava’s post Shocking Facts About Franchising Success Rates Revealed is how clearly he calls out the sleazy or sloppy (take your choice) use of very old statistics to mislead and entice people. He concludes: A simple scan of some of the cheaper-looking websites that some of the franchise... Read More »
Pictures Proving Pictures Can’t Prove Anything
By Tim Berry
It’s been a long time since I’ve seen this much eloquence in both words and pictures. It’s a great illustration of how a good picture is worth a thousand words, and then again, maybe also why it isn’t always. That’s Correlation or Causation? on BusinessWeek.com. The words: Need to prove something you already believe? All you... Read More »
Stop. Don’t Do That Survey. Talk to People Instead.
By Tim Berry
Yes, there are some amazing tools for doing market surveys quickly and easy. I use SurveyMonkey myself, very happily. And I know of (but don’t have reason to use) cool tools to send surveys to selected groups of respondents. But there’s a problem with that, especially if you overuse it. Most surveys are seriously flawed.... Read More »
Do You Believe Your Analytics?
By Tim Berry
What I hate about analytics ia that sometimes numbers are wrong or misleading, but when they are numbers, we’re not supposed to argue. I like analysis when it adds information and context to human decisions. What we have now as analytics available for marketing and web development is amazing, especially compared to the “olden days”... Read More »
Does the New York Tech Boom Have Clues for Everywhere Else?
By Tim Berry
It was Wednesday night, a full auditorium at the 92nd St. Y in Manhattan’s upper East Side. We’d had a meeting in the late afternoon, got tied up, so we arrived late and took the only two seats left, against the wall. Even the balcony was full. The audience was a total mixup of suits,... Read More »
How Much Should You Worry About Your Competition?
By Tim Berry
I’m intrigued with Steve Thoeny’s comment earlier this week to my post about market research. Steve quoted Joel Spolsky, Co-founder Stack Exchange, and one of my favorite writers, with this suggestion: Talk to your customers. Find out what they need. Don’t pay any attention to the competition. They’re not relevant to you. I love Joel’s... Read More »
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