Review of "Small Data: The Tiny Clues That Uncover Huge Trends," by Martin Lindstrom

 Review of

Small Data: The Tiny Clues That Uncover Huge Trends, by Martin Lindstrom, ISBN 9781250080684

Five out of five stars

Reasons to buck the trend and go small

 The conventional wisdom is that the key to success in business is to construct and mine large data sets. Generally speaking, the bigger the better. This book is constructed on a theme that is the exact opposite. The author presents several examples of where he used a small number of observations properly interpreted to discover and analyze major trends in consumer behavior.

 All are interesting and very well presented. One of the best and most significant for the modern world is about the LEGO building blocks. The company was experiencing falling sales and the solution was not to dumb the kits down but to make them even more complicated. Purchasers appreciated the challenge of creating monster constructions using the blocks. In an environment where the overall trend appears to be the making of things easier, this trend was refreshing.

 Another significant point that is obvious when stated is based on the Roomba vacuuming robot. It turned out that people that owned them treated them as if they were a pet. Earlier versions would utter phrases like “Uh oh” when they bumped into something. When that feature was removed, some of the charm, grace and demand was lost. The use of a Roomba as a device for men to pick up women is also mentioned.

 This book should be read by all people that take marketing and the analysis of consumer behavior seriously. In a world where massive data sets receive nearly all the marketing love, this book will convince you that you need to pay attention to small numbers of consumers. For some brands, it can be the difference between rising and falling sales.

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