Mythbuster: the obsession with 'granular' data

This article warns of the dangers of focussing on granular data, as short-term fluctuations say little for brand building.

Mythbuster: the obsession with 'granular' data

Les Binet and Sarah Carteradam&eveDDB

Les Binet and Sarah Carter get a little bit angry about some of the nonsense they hear around them… like the obsession with 'granular' data

Some years ago, we met a client who was wildly excited about large customer data sets. "It's the granularity that's so amazing," he enthused. "For instance, people who shop in petrol stations on a Thursday…" and so it went on. Eventually, we asked a simple question: what was happening to market share? He seemed slightly annoyed. Market share wasn't relevant for a...

Not a subscriber?

Schedule your live demo with our team today

WARC helps you to plan, create and deliver more effective marketing

  • Prove your case and back-up your idea

  • Get expert guidance on strategic challenges

  • Tackle current and emerging marketing themes

We’re long-term subscribers to WARC and it’s a tool we use extensively. We use it to source case studies and best practice for the purposes of internal training, as well as for putting persuasive cases to clients. In compiling a recent case for long-term, sustained investment in brand, we were able to support key marketing principles with numerous case studies sourced from WARC. It helped bring what could have been a relatively dry deck to life with recognisable brand successes from across a broad number of categories. It’s incredibly efficient to have such a wealth of insight in one place.

Insights Team
Bray Leino

You’re in good company

We work with 80% of Forbes' most valuable brands* and 80% of the world's top top-of-the-class agencies.

* Top 10 brands