Ep.45 - Sheila Byfield – Combining data with common sense for better decisions

This week, Karen is joined by Sheila Byfield, who has led a successful career specialising in research and data analysis within media and advertising. In this episode, Sheila shares what she has learnt over the years as well as her frustration over the direction that the advertising sector has taken - frustration which ultimately led her to write a book called ‘In with the old. In with the new’. She talks about how promises to change the interruption model were not kept, how time pressure impacts ads’ effectiveness, and how digital advertising could benefit from learnings from the past. Most importantly, she highlights the significance of human intervention and common sense in technological and data developments as well as their applications. 

Enjoy! 

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Show notes:  

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Sheila’s book: https://www.amazon.co.uk/old-new-Sheila-Byfield/dp/0244501955/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=sheila+byfield&qid=1634586146&sr=8-1 

Reading recommendations:

• The Attention Economy by Karen Nelson-Field 
• The long and the short of it: Balancing long and short-term marketing strategies by Les Binet and Peter Field. 
• Hello world by Hanah Fry 
• Invisible women by Caroline Criado-Perez 

Podcasts recommendations

• The digital human: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01n7094/episodes/player 
• Marketing Week’s podcast: https://www.marketingweek.com/marketing-podcasts/