Category: english

Tips on Data Imputation From Machine Learning Experts

Missing values are a critical issue in statistics and machine learning (which is “advanced statistics”). Data imputation deals with ways to fill those missing values. Andriy Burkov made this statement a few days ago [1]: “The best way to fill a missing value of an attribute is to build a classifier (if the attribute is […]

Creating Buyer Personas: Common Interview Questions

Introduction At Qatar Computing Research Institute (QCRI), we are developing a system for automatic persona generation (APG). The demo is available online at https://persona.qcri.org As a part of this research, we’re interested in the information needs of end users of personas [1]. People working in different domains are interested in different information, after all. For example, […]

Google Analytics: 21 Questions to Get Started

I was teaching a course called “Web & Mobile Analytics” at Aalto University back in 2015. As a part of that course, the students conducted an analytics audit for their chosen website. I’m sharing the list of questions I made for that audit, as it’s a useful list for getting to know Google Analytics. The […]

Simple methods for anomaly detection in e-commerce

Anomaly is a deviation from the expected value. The main challenges are: (a) how much the deviation should be to be classified as an anomaly, and (b) what time frame or subset of data should we examine. The simplest way to answer those questions is to use your marketer’s intuition. As an e-commerce manager, you […]

Platform metrics: Some ideas

I was chatting with Lauri [1] about platform research. I claimed that the research has not that many implications for real-world companies apart from the basic constructs of network effects, two-sidedness, tipping, marquee users, strategies such as envelopment, and of course many challenges, including chicken-and-egg problems, monetization dilemma, and remora’s curse (see my dissertation on […]

Digital analytics maturity model

Digital analytics maturity model: Concepts — here, focus on is on buzzwords and realization that “we should do something”. Tools — here, focus is on tools, i.e. “Let’s use this shiny new technology and it will solve all our problems.” Value — here, we finally focus on what matters: how will the tools and technologies […]

Problem of continuous value in SaaS business

A major challenge for many SaaS businesses is to provide continuous value, so that the users are compelled to continue using the service. There’s a risk of opportunism if the user can achieve his goals with one-time use; he then either uses the free trial version, or only subscribes for one month. For example, some […]

Identifying opportunities that Google and Facebook can’t handle

It’s almost impossible to beat Facebook’s or Google’s algorithms in ad optimization, because they have access to individual-level data whereas the advertiser only gets aggregates, and even their supply is limited. But, there are two opportunities I see which Google and Facebook don’t handle: 1. Use of CRM data Especially purchase history (=lifetime value), product […]