Menu
the REFERENCE

Blog

Our latest analyses and hands-on advice.
Only show blog posts on
Digital marketing Creation and implementation Strategy and consultancy The Reference Data Sitecore Symposium 2018

Natural Language Processing: a marketer's point of view

Natural Language Processing is a subfield of artificial intelligence and computer science, that concerns itself with a computers understanding of the human language. In recent years, many of its derived applications have been implemented in our everyday lives. I tell my car to call Peter, ask Shazam about that catchy song and, maybe soon, demand my computer to produce a Shakespeare-like sonnet to sway my girlfriend of her feet. These are some really cool applications, but if your company is not in the tech sector, is there business value in it for you?
4/29/2019
Jean-Michel Staelens
Data

Big data: size doesn't matter, it's what you do with it

"Big data is not actually about the data. The revolution is not that there’s more data available. The revolution is that we know what to do with it now. That’s really the amazing thing." It's a quote from Gary King, political scientist and head of the Institute for Quantitative Social Science. In full honesty, we tend to overuse it in presentations and conversations regarding the buzzwordization of the field of data science. However, it is the best representation of how we think about data at The Reference.
4/11/2019
R Peters

7 steps to building a roadmap with confidence

A client of ours asked us to help create a roadmap for a B2B customer service portal for one of their North American business units. They got stuck deciding on what to include in the portal and what to launch with first.

Our intense collaboration involved many of the client's stakeholders. It resulted in a roadmap where customer and business value blended perfectly together.

These are the 7 steps we took to maximize the customer portal value for our client and for their customers.
3/29/2019
Mathieu Dhondt
Strategy and consultancy

A serious introduction into the LEGO Serious Play method. No, seriously...

The LEGO® Serious Play® method* is a method that facilitates meetings, communication and problem-solving. It can be applied in any situation where it is extremely important that we overcome habitual thinking and where we need the maximum available knowledge, input, and attention of everyone involved in order to reach our goals. Often times these meetings are on a strategic or on a team level. 

This blogpost is an introduction to the method. If you don't feel like reading, be sure to subscribe to our podcast, where you'll find an entire episode dedicated to LEGO Serious Play.
3/25/2019
Frank De Graeve
Strategy and consultancy

What are data scientists?

“We’re not looking for the overly complex analyses of a data scientist; we just need someone who can simply deliver us clear insights that help us understand our business better”. It was the comment I received recently when pitching for a position at a large company that was in search of a data-driven marketer. The statement caught my attention, as it conflicted with my personal perception of a data scientist. Up until that point, I had always associated the term ‘data science’ with one’s ability to turn raw data into valuable business insights. So I asked myself: isn’t helping companies understand their business thoroughly the exact function of a data scientist? Clearly, not all managers seem to think so.
3/20/2019
Senne Vermassen
Data

POSITION SWITCH AT GOOGLE: ‘AVERAGE POSITION’ IS DISAPPEARING

Changes and innovations are the only constants in the online marketing community.
Google is no exception: it recently announced that the ‘average position’ will be disappearing in September 2019 because the relevance of this statistic has decreased over the years. It is hardly a surprise, but this change does have all sorts of repercussions for reporting and optimisation techniques. We discuss the expected impacts below. 
3/6/2019
Malika Meddour
Digital marketing

Turning stoppers into stayers - How churn prediction leads to a larger and more satisfied customer base

We have all faced this situation: after a period of undisputed loyalty towards a certain service or product, we decide to cut ties and go down a different path. It may be that we simply lost interest in that addictive game on our smartphone after a few days, changed our mobile phone provider within months or hopped over to another bank after years of contentment. One thing is for sure: we have officially churned. For most of today’s companies, this is just another unnoticed blip on the radar. For the customer however, it is most likely not.
1/17/2019
Senne Vermassen
Data

Don't reinvent the wheel: why an agency should be your data science partner

Data science has a lot in common with pizza: although you can combine as many toppings as you want, many recipes have a proven track record. Think about the margherita, the four cheese and the contested Hawaiian. Just like pizza, many data science applications have become commodified over time. AI applications such as recommendation engines, search engines, segmentation and labeling tools are available by default in many web and marketing ecosystems. This has some important implications for choosing data science partners. Yes, in this article I serve my own benefit. Nonetheless, it's also in your interest and – trust me – it would be ill-advised to stop reading.
1/7/2019
R Peters
Data
top

Our work

Our expertise

About us

Contact

THE REFERENCE
79 Madison Ave
New York, NY 10016, USA
Tel +1 866 499 9591
info@the-reference.com


The Reference has its office in the heart of Manhattan.
“I want to wake up in that city that never sleeps, and find I'm king of the hill, top of the list, head of the heap” – Frank Sinatra
Why this image?