Building a Digital Analytics Organization: Create Value by Integrating Analytical Processes, Technology, and People into Business Operations

9. Qualitative and Voice of Customer Data and Digital Analytics

A commonly heard mantra in digital analytics is that the behavioral data collected by the analytics tool du jour—whether the most advanced site analytics tool to the newest social media listening tool, and from the most basic free analytics tool to the most expensive paid analytics tool—is that data can tell you the “what” about the themes in your data. But the same behavioral, digital data can’t tell you “why” the themes in your data are “what” you’ve identified them to be. You’ve heard it before, “analytics can’t tell you ‘why!’” In other words, there is a somewhat accurate belief that you can’t determine why data changed from looking at data. That idea is not entirely accurate ...