“Data driven culture”, “Data driven design”, “MoneyBall”, “KPIs”…
We all need data. We can’t run our businesses without it. I’m just wondering how much of it do we really need?
The problem with data is its tendency to inflate. It starts with a simple Google Analytics/Mixpanel set of events and before you know it you’re spending $1000 of your investor’s money on buying a 42″ screen to display your amazing “data driven” charts to everyone that visits your office.
When I read Moneyball what struck me most wasn’t the data driven decision making. As I read the book the words kept desolving until I was left with a single word… “Walks“. Understanding that walks, maybe the least sexy piece of data out there, is THE most important piece of data in Baseball is what made Billy Beane special to me. It was his ability to see the single stat in the heart of it all that impressed me the most…. “Walks, Walks, Walks”. If you didn’t learn to walk you had no place in Billy’s team.
What’s your SPI?
When we set to build MyFamilio we took a bit of drastic approach to analytics. We decided our SPI (Single Performance Indicator) for the time being is “moments shared” and we looked for a way that would reflect to us how well we’re doing.
What if a bell rings every time a family moment was shared on MyFamilio? If we suck then there will be no bells ringing. If we’re doing OK then the bells WILL ring. But only when they ring so often it make our lives unbearable will we know that we’ve succeeded. In which case we’ll need to find a new KPI to fight over.
And this is exactly what we did. Instead of displaying our Mixpanel charts on LCDs we tied our SPI to an app and this app “rings a bell” whenever someone shares a moment with their family on MyFamilio.
If you choose your SPI bravely you’re about to be incredibly depressed. There is nothing more depressing than the silence that follows when people don’t use your service and the bells stop ringing. I’ve never found a more effective way of telling you “You’re not there yet… Go on what are you waiting for? Make those people happy”
We call this approach Singlytics. It changed the way we look at analytics. The question is… Can you handle it? :)
Posted
on Sunday, October 23rd, 2011 
Name's Avi Charkham. I'm a product person, co-founder @ Familio and Chief Product @ lool Ventures. Normally I prefer to simply tweet my thoughts but some times 140 are simply not enough :)
KPIs are usually meant for reporting, but I’m not sure how well they suite into analysis.
The only thing reporting and analysis has in common is the person who actually performs them. Your approach is great for reporting and monitoring, but what about answering the “Why?” question.
I guess that it takes far more than a single performance indicator to identify and resolve a bottleneck, understand your users personas and treat each differently etc.