Data is Overrated (If You Want Your Brand to Last)
The case for putting humans first, even when the numbers say otherwise.
In this post:
Data is a Tool, Not the Truth
I was halfway through Careless People: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed, and Lost Idealism when I had to pause. Sarah Wynn-Williams was describing how Facebook’s algorithm gave the “angry” emoji extra weight — meaning outrage spread faster, wider, and more profitably.
It was a gut punch, because I’ve been in those rooms. I’ve heard — and said — “the data says” like it was the final word. I’ve also always battled with the balance between trusting my gut and following the numbers. (To be honest, my gut is usually right, with the data backing it up later.)
But when your annual bonus depends on hitting certain metrics, the temptation to center yourself over the bigger picture is real. As discussed in the Proxy podcast with Yowei Shaw in the episode “How to Cope with Now,” psychologists have found people are more likely to help a single individual than an abstract group — and that bias shows up in business decisions too. If we’re not careful, the numbers become a shield for self-interest.
The best work comes from curating that balance — an art and a science — and it’s one I’m proud to say I’ve never turned into a Facebook-sized cautionary tale.
The Data Problem We’re All Swimming In
We’ve known for years that data can be used to manipulate. Careless People lays bare how Facebook’s leadership knew negative interactions fueled engagement and kept users hooked. The more outrage, the more comments. The more comments, the more revenue.
We also know that nearly 50% of all internet traffic is now bot-generated. Add in the speed of trend cycles — TikTok sounds that burn out in days, Instagram formats that tank overnight — and you start to see how fragile “what’s working” really is.
Here’s the kicker: you can have millions of followers and likes, but if your audience isn’t engaging in meaningful ways — comments, shares, reposts…purchases — you’re no better than the “spray and pray” marketers of the past. Big numbers might make for a pretty slide in a deck, but they don’t get to the core human experience.
And that’s something data and AI-driven tech will always struggle with: they’re transactional: one input = one output. Humans are messy, colorful, and full of nuance that takes more than a dashboard to understand.
When the Numbers Lie (and How to Catch Them)
How we store and collect data matters. How we use it matters even more.
It’s an art and a science:
The Art: Drawing from experience, knowing your audience, reading the cultural room
The Science: Testing hypotheses, gathering results, and using them to guide decisions
Most brands skew toward one or the other — the art-led brands that fly by instinct but can’t prove ROI, or the science-led brands that let the numbers dictate everything and slowly strip out the human connection. The real work is holding both.
An example from my own work — Slim Jim
When we first got the A/B test results for a turnkey content campaign, we had a clear winner. Cut and dry. Done. Right? Wrong.
My gut told me to dig deeper. I scrolled through the comments to see why the content was resonating. That’s when I spotted it: the top-performing video was sparking conversations tied to a geopolitical event, completely unrelated to the brand.
The numbers told us one thing. The comments told us another. Without that deeper look, we could have poured money into attention we didn’t actually want.
This is why the art matters as much as the science. Data gave us the “what.” Human judgment gave us the “why.”
Making Data Work for Humans
Here’s the playbook for avoiding the traps we’ve just talked about:
1. Start with your brand guide
Are you hyper-clear on your mission, vision, goals? Is your communication strategy actionable enough that the brand sounds like itself in every channel?
2. Run a quick activation audit
Do your brand’s campaigns and activations align with the brand guide? This is where a tool like my DIY Brand Guide (coming soon!) can help identify misalignments before they grow into bigger problems.
3. Focus your channel strategy
Where are you seeing traction? Where are you losing time and energy? Choose sustainability and depth over trying to be everywhere. You can be great at a few things or kind of okay at a lot of things.
💡 If you’re not sure where to start, I offer free clarity calls to help identify the simplest next steps to align your marketing with your brand’s values.
Following this framework looks different depending on your scale, but the principle stays the same: let your brand’s values lead, and let the data support them.
When a small business does it well, the results can be deeply authentic:
The Raven Bookstore – When the owner published a zine-like book explaining the importance of supporting local bookstores over Amazon, it wasn’t a calculated marketing play. But it sold over 25,000 zine copies and 10,000 in book form, reinforcing the store’s core values and putting it on the map as a leader in the indie bookstore space.
At a corporate level, the same idea applies:
Rare Beauty – CMO Katie Welch has been deliberate about making Rare Beauty its own entity, with a mission, vision, and values distinct from Selena Gomez. In an oversaturated celebrity beauty market, they’ve “paid attention to attention” by connecting with audiences beyond Gomez’s bubble — making the brand more durable and inclusive.
A Brand Promise Is a Promise Kept
On The CEO’s Guide to Marketing podcast, Welch summed it up perfectly:
“Brands are a promise kept… If you break that brand promise and you’re trying to have marketing as a conversation, why would they listen to you? Why would they talk back?”
That means your goal isn’t to go viral. Your goal is to make your audience feel welcome in the space that is your brand. And that promise is built over time.
Hot take: I’m watching Duolingo start to drift from its promise. Their social team still nails the “unhinged” approach, but leadership decisions around return-to-office mandates and AI adoption are creating friction. Recent comments sections are full of people calling out the gap between their values and their actions.
Cool, so you’re going full AI — but that likely means fewer hires and possibly layoffs. Suddenly, the team that brings the brand to life online is being asked to “perform” a promise leadership isn’t keeping. Once that trust starts to erode, you can’t data your way back to it.
And here’s the link back to Careless People: just like Facebook, even brands with strong audience relationships can drift without realizing it — especially when chasing short-term wins or efficiency at the expense of connection.
The Bottom Line
We can’t treat data like the hero of the story. It’s a tool — powerful, yes — but only in the hands of someone who knows how to use it to balance the art and the science of brand marketing.
The best brands use data to support human connection, not replace it. They build strategies that keep their promise, campaigns that reflect their values, and audiences that trust them enough to stick around.
If you want your marketing to matter long after the dashboard resets, remember this: Start with the humans. Let the numbers follow.
Further Reading & Listening
Sarah Wynn-Williams — Careless People, A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed, and Lost Idealism
Proxy with Yowei Shaw — Episode “How to Cope with Now”
Raven Bookstore — An interview with Danny Caine on How to Resist Amazon
The CEO’s Guide to Marketing — Episode “The One with Rare Beauty CMO Katie Welch”
🚪 Keep the door swinging for Come Back Soon
💡 Book a clarity (or sanity) session – I help brands find their throughline so marketing feels human again. Let’s see what’s next for your brand. Book a session →
🥤 Buy me a chai – Not a coffee person, but I do run on iced chai and validation. If this post made you think, laugh, or screenshot something for later—send a latte my way →
❤️ Spread the word – Like, comment, share, restack—help this little corner of the internet reach more humans (and fewer bots). Share now →
🗣 Join the conversation – What’s on your brand brain right now?
Defining your “thing”
Getting in front of the right people
Making data work for humans, not the other way around. Leave a comment →