Decode the Data: A Marketing Intelligence Challenge

Today, the AMA was led by President Anjali Sharma in our Decode the Data: Marketing Intelligence Challenge workshop. For most, this meeting was a great introduction to marketing analytics and an exercise in the application of marketing in a quantitative sense.

Since this topic was new to many, before introducing the task, Anjali briefly explained some important marketing analytics concepts, with the key takeaways being:

• The click-through rate (CTR) regarding engagement

• The conversion rate refers to the measurement of the efficiency of traffic to purchases

• The cost per acquisition (CPA) measures the cost of each customer gained

• Average Order Value (AOV) is calculated by dividing total revenue by the total number of orders and is important in indicating revenue (higher AOV = higher revenue)

We were then given the following scenario:

“You are the marketing analytics team for ELEVATE, a sustainable athleisure startup launching a new performance hoodie. You have $100,000 remaining in budget and four weeks before launch. You are provided with test campaign performance data. Your objective is to maximize revenue using the data below.”

Our job was to analyze and piece together the data given to us in order to generate revenue and allocate funds for the marketing campaign. The team with the highest revenue would win.

Before crunching the numbers, my team initially imagined that TikTok and Instagram would have the highest conversion rate and, therefore, gain the most revenue. However, while working through the analytics, we discovered that the marketing methods Google Search and Emailing had the highest conversion rate and were therefore more profitable in this scenario. This taught us about the importance of checking numerical performances because specific factors and different situations may lead one common outcome to have a vastly different outcome.

At the ten-minute mark, however, Anjali threw a curveball at the groups. She introduced an update from leadership that, due to supply chain uncertainty, our budgets had been reduced from $100,000 to $75,000, which resulted in quick problem-solving and budget readjustments for the group.

After making our final readjustments from this last-minute hiccup, we all took turns presenting our findings and explaining our calculations. Some groups decided to fund currently profitable channels, while others decided to invest in lower-performing channels in the hope of future growth. However, a majority of the AMA agreed on investing in Email and Google Search marketing, due to the present positive outcomes of the calculations. 

To conclude today’s marketing workshop, Anjali introduced a list of Marketing Intelligence positions for those who enjoyed the workshop and are interested in pursuing careers with similar work, including, but not limited to:

• Growth Analyst

• Revenue Operations Analyst

• Customer Acquisition Manager

• Marketing Data Strategist.

Thank you to all AMA members who were present at today’s Decode the Data: A Marketing Intelligence Challenge workshop, and we will see you all next Tuesday!

-Helena Malcom