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Satish Chandra Gupta
Satish Chandra Gupta

Posted on • Updated on • Originally published at ml4devs.com

Actionable Insights from 4 Types of Data Analytics

“Let’s collect all data we can, and we will fish for insights later.” Have you heard this before?

That approach seldom works. On rare occasions when it does work a little, the RoI is very low w.r.t. the cost of collecting, processing, and storing volumes of data.
Analytics yields better returns when you start with a goal.

Besides, not all analytics are equal. Fun stats are amusing. But actionable insights that can guide you to the next steps are way more valuable.

The Drivetrain Approach offers a systematic way to produce actionable insights. It has four steps:

  1. Define Objective: Start by defining your goal.
  2. Specify Levers: Specify the inputs that you control, the levers you can pull to influence the outcome.
  3. Collect Data: Figure out what data you need to collect for measuring the effect of pulling those levers.
  4. Identify Actions: Analyze data and build statistical models to compute which lever to move and how much to achieve the desired outcome.

This article will apply the Drivetrain approach to a problem: starting with a goal to collecting and analyzing data and identifying actions to achieve that goal.

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