“Big data has become the X factor of modern marketing, the hero of every marketer’s story. But it’s a promise at risk of letting you down. You may be thinking that data will magically turn bush-league marketing into a winning ‘Moneyball’ performance. But that’s an artifact of our big data obsession. Data, alone, isn’t what makes marketing move the needle for business.”

“Data can play a leading role in developing strategy and bringing precision to execution, but it does nothing — absolutely nothing — to stir motivation and create the desire that makes cash registers ring. Data is important, but it’s content that makes an emotional connection.”

– Harvard Business Review, February 25, 2014, “What Data-Obsessed Marketers Don’t Understand,” by Jake Sorofman and Andrew Frank