10 Steps to Digital Data Quality Nirvana

More than 80% of sites have improperly deployed data collectors, at some point resulting in broken web pages, loss of site traffic, and lost sales.

What is Data Quality?

The notion of data quality in the digital world is something of a boondoggle. Everyone talks about it and everyone expects it, but so very few companies do what is necessary in order to achieve it. Many companies seem to believe (or would prefer to continue believing) that somehow merely collecting data is enough.  They believe that ensuring data quality would be complicated and costly.

The unfortunate truth is that, when it comes to data quality, ignorance is complicated and costly.

The Cost of Poor Data

For example, when you realize your data is being leaked to competitors or that an important business decision was made last week was based on bad data, ignorance quickly turns from blissfully cheap to woefully expensive.

The fact that you’re reading this blog post means that you know the importance of data quality. There is a story behind each and every number in your data, and quality data tells the truth.

Managing Data Quality

The key to success is to learn how to manage that story and ensure quality. Tim Munsell, ObservePoint customer and Web Analyst at DaveRamsey.com, compares investing in data quality to something we all know about; “it’s like an oil change on your car, preventive maintenance against bigger problems down the road.”

Now that you have a good grasp on the what, let’s talk about how. This post is the first of many in which you will learn how to apply the following prescribed data quality tips:

1. Assign Ownership to Data Quality
2. Define Governance for Data Quality
3. Deploy a Robust Tag Auditing Platform
4. Set a Rhythm for Scanning
5. Audit Data Collection Once, Twice, Three Times
6. Set Proactive Alerts
7. Follow the Data Quality Management Process Part 1, Part 2, Part 3
8. Confirm Complex Integrations
9. Leverage Audits for Documentation
10. Prevent Data Leakage

Once you’ve followed these steps, you’ll have made the correct people, process, and policy changes to correct lingering data quality problems and prevent them in the future. After all, active investment in data quality secures your return on all digital marketing technology.

Do you want to improve your data quality? Try a free mini-audit. We’ll analyze 100 pages and let you know what your marketing technology is doing.

This post is based on the whitepaper Data Quality and the Digital World by Eric T. Peterson, Principal consultant at Web Analytics Demystified.