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Amazon continues to surprise. Its latest segue from online shopping and shipping megalopolis is a venture into streaming video via Amazon Studios. The team is attempting to predict the next hit TV series from pilots featured on Amazon’s website in April.
Rather than use internal creative professionals from studios and production houses to select TV pilots for long-term runs, Amazon put 13 pilots on its website and allowed visitors to vote.
Here’s what’s amazingly basic about this whole story. The metrics Amazon used to determine its pilot selection were:
- Likes
- Shares
- Votes
- Surveys
- Comments
This fascinates me because of its simplicity. There is so much emphasis being placed on big data analysis and how data drive strategy. While Amazon is certainly using big data (in this case a lot of people placing votes, right?) to influence video streaming program selection, it didn’t indicate it used in-depth software and programming to analyze which show will become a hit.
According to the Wall Street Journal, “Amazon Mines User Data in Search of TV Hits,” on Nov. 2-3, 2013, Amazon Studios has selected three of the top-ranked vote getters and put them into production. The pilots are slated to be made available to Amazon Prime members in November.
What does this imply for your own big data analysis? Could we perhaps be putting too much emphasis in data when the simpler metrics of likes, shares, votes, and comments are sufficient?
How are you using big data in your business? Is its analysis truly driving strategy, lead generation, and sales?
Coming from a public relations background where data used to be the bailiwick of marketing, the numbers were rarely my favorite. It’s hard to crack that barrier to entry, but it’s stupid not to. Numbers do tell stories especially when you’re smart enough to interpret them.
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