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Yes, but marketers don't really care about math. Only about the numbers! You would expect a few hiccups and a steep learning curve when the product they are tr
by V_9 6y ago
Yes, but marketers don't really care about math. Only about the numbers!
You would expect a few hiccups and a steep learning curve when the product they are trying to buy is a bid for visibility on insanely complex networks of platforms using said rocket science to guess where one's mind is at.
Disclaimer: worked years in the space on the topic of performance, only one time ever have i seen an AB test correctly run and correctly understood by a client. Most requested false numbers because they couldn't understand the difference between branding, attribution and incremental sales. To be fair, neither could most anyone working in the field... Seems like that doesn't change too quick!
- kleiba 6y agoYes, but marketers don't really care about math. Only about the numbers! This is hilarious.
- jiofih 6y agoAnd sad. Same thing happens in data science now - people are happy to have any number regardless of correctness. They just need something to report on and keep the work going.
- helmholtz 6y agoThat famous saying known to those of us in scientific computing: The purpose of computing is insight, not numbers.
- czep 6y agoAs long as data science remains subservient to Product, the inevitable result is cherry picking and post hoc rationalizing of some PM's intuition. To blame is the "embedded" model in which DS works within (and takes direction from) a cross functional team driven by a PM.
- iamacyborg 6y agoHah, exactly what I was writing about here https://www.jacquescorbytuech.com/writing/marketers-addicted-bad-data https://www.jacquescorbytuech.com/writing/marketers-addicted...
- pc86 6y agoHi, please don't do this. If the comments become just replies saying "I wrote about this on my blog!" with a link, they're unreadable. If you summarized your thoughts and posted it as its own comment, without a self-promotional link, I'm sure it would be very well received.
- iamacyborg 6y agoSounds fair! Thanks for the feedback. The article did spur an interesting discussion previously on HN when I published it but seems relevant again given the ongoing discussion. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25016532 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25016532
- pc86 6y agoThis is one of those things that isn't a big deal in isolated instances, but becomes an issue if it gets more prevalent, so it's always hard to know when/if to even say anything :)
- webmaven 6y agoThe other problem is that the worst offenders are the ones least likely to respond to getting or seeing this sort of nudge, so there is some adverse selection going on. It's probably self correcting over the long term, but meanwhile we lose the sort of links that would (or rather, might) enrich the conversation through overcorrection by posters. It's the obverse side of the slippery slope, I guess.