1. Telling the Story with your Data
Making The Case to the Boss Cyndi W. Greenglass
Diamond Communication Solutions

2. and prosper as a communications professional
My Promise to you
If you can handle the truth and are not afraid of a little math, you will live long
and prosper as a communications professional
I am passionate about our need as IMC marketers to embrace data, analytics and measurement. But most of us suffer from two major problems: We our afraid of the math and don’t want to be held accountable.

3. Agenda Challenges we face Reporting V. Analysis
Why images and stories are so important
Tips for successful storytelling
Q&A

4. Some Challenges we Face
In Public Relations, we need to be able to communicate complex information
Consumers are increasingly overwhelmed with messaging
Many industries use confusing terminology
There are concerns about trust
You have about 10 minutes to make your case

5. Unstructured Data = BIG DATA It is the Fastest Growing Enterprise Data
Unstructured data can't be stored in rows and columns, e.g. files, word-processing text documents, PowerPoint presentations, JPEG/GIF image files, and MPEG video files
Stored as Blobs (Binary Large Objects) in relational databases

6. Data without context is meaningless … period
What about Little Data?
Data without context is meaningless … period

7. Please don’t puke on me
It is faster for people to grasp the meaning of many data points when they are displayed in charts and graphs rather than poring over piles of spreadsheets or reading pages and pages of reports.

8. And This is our BIG Opportunity
Data is scary
Data can be tortured to tell you anything
Data is not memorable
Our presentations are boring … at best
Data Presentations are not about the data
They are about the meaning in the data

9. Analytics is data that you use to
make smarter decisions about your
business (Kaushik, 2013).
In order to get to the decision part, we must slog our way through the dull, boring, and tedious part – which is the “reporting” or metrics.
In other words, before we can tell a story, we need to collect all of the facts and figures.

10. It’s Like Peanut Butter Without Jelly
Reporting has no meaning without analysis and analysis is not possible with meaningful data collection.
Reporting is the what, the facts, the metrics
Analysis answers the all-important why. It is the magic
One does not exist without the other.

11. Parsimony
Discuss the gift concept

12. Telling the Story in Your Data
Needs to create meaning and relevance
Needs to be memorable
Needs to provide context
Needs to answer the question
Not Yours … Theirs!

13. What is the question that this data answers?
Ask Yourself
Over and over and over again….
What is the question that this data answers?
Or, more bluntly, so what?
If you cannot answer these questions, you are not ready for prime time.

14. What we know about how people consume information

15. Why Pictures? Are we in Kindergarten?
Pictures are remembered better than words
People can remember more than 2,000 pictures with at least 90% accuracy in recognition tests over a period of several days
This excellent memory for pictures consistently exceeds our ability to remember words
Graphics and pictures help people see things that may not be obvious to them. Instead of individual data points, we can “see” trends more readily.
Visualizations also convey information in a universal manner and make it easier to share ideas with others.
It lets you ask:
“Do you see what I see?” And it can even help answer questions like “What would happen if we made an adjustment to this or that area?”

16. Picture Superiority Effect (PSE)
More practically, if you need to remember a word, saying it out loud will probably improve your memory. If you’re presenting concepts that you want others to remember, pictures AND spoken words are still probably your best bet
The finding of better memory for pictures was reported as early as the 19th century (Kirkpatrick, 1894).
Kirkpatrick demonstrated that real objects were better remembered than either written or spoken words, even after several days. This affect is known as the “picture superiority effect (PSE)”.
 As a result of this research, we have come to understand that the human brain can grasp, process, and retain pictures with greater meaning than numbers or words alone. Understanding this basic human dynamic is critical to us as marketers.

17. Memory is Enhanced with Pictures
Pictures are actually worth 1.5 as much as words!

18. The Power Behind the Numbers
BE NEO

19. Data Visualization It’s a lot more than just pretty pictures
When done well, data visualization can help marketers and non- analysts understand and retain the information so that they can make better decisions.
AND … it presents data in a way that communicators can easily interpret and explain.
For example, graphic displays are much easier to understand instead of excel spreadsheets or data dumps, and pictures can indeed tell the story.

20. Which is Easier to Understand ?
Which is more memorable?
Words and numbers are visually sparse, as the letters are usually presented in one color (black) using a common font that is looked at along with many other words at the same time so there is no visual distinctiveness (Oates, n.d.).
If it is hard to remember undifferentiated characters, consider how difficult it is to remember numbers. To help make metrics and numbers more relevant, meaningful and memorable, marketers and statisticians have been using data visualization for years.

21. Data Visualization
Data visualization is the graphical display of abstract information for two purposes: sense-making (also called data analysis) and communication.
Important stories live in our data and data visualization is a powerful means to discover and understand these stories, and then to present them to others.
Weather Data
Weather data from:

22. But Keep in Mind There are scanners and readers
People read from left to right and top to bottom
People do better with shorter sentences
In a letter, people read in this order:
P.S., Salutation, “Johnson Box”, 1st sentence (or words) of each paragraph
Techniques like fonts, bold, and color break up the text
Could be good to highlight text
Or bad and could prevent comprehension

23. Know Your Audience
To be a successful data storyteller, you need to master some basic concepts that can help you generate the best visuals including:
 Determine what you are trying to visualize and what kind of information you want to communicate.
Know your audience and understand how they processes visual information.
Use a visual that conveys the information in the best and simplest form for your audience. Data visualization is an art and a science unto itself, and there are many graphical techniques that can be used to help people understand the story their data is telling.
If you need to spend more than 30 seconds explaining the chart – it isn’t working.

24. Presenting the Vision

25. Storytelling Builds Collaboration
The story allows you to answer the meaningful questions you have as a marketer, and the all-important questions your boss has too such as:
What is working?
What is not working?
Did we succeed?
And in all cases – WHY?

26. Tell me Three Times Tell me what you are going to say Say it
Summarize it

27. Beware of “Death by PowerPoint”
Remember that you should never have more than 3 bullets on a slide and no more than 1 slide for every 2 minutes. Combine the slide with your narrative for added impact.
Too good to be true – too much animation, flash or pizazz diminishes the value of the data you are presenting. Strive for purity and simplicity.
The infographic that killed the whale. NOONE wants to look at infographics that cannot be viewed “above the crease” or on one simple horizontal slide.

28. 3 Types of Graphics

29. Choose Your Weapon
For example: Good for comparisons in an investment portfolio

30. Get Granular

31. Show me the View in the Rear View Mirror

32. How to Create a Memorable Presentation

33. Sometimes the Most Powerful Chart
Is no chart at all. Just one BIG Number

34. Ask Yourself What is the main message you wish to convey?
Over and over and over again….
What is the main message you wish to convey?
And then ask ….
What is the desired outcome of this meeting?
If you cannot answer these questions, you are not still ready for prime time.

35. In Summary
Reporting gives us the data points that we need to conduct analysis
Analysis answers our questions
Or shows us patterns and stories not yet written
Visualization creates collaboration
Important stories live in data and storytelling makes them memorable

36. What do you Think? Cyndi Greenglass cgreenglass@dmsolutions.com
@directchick