The Signal Economy: How to target new revenues through predictive analytics

You may have had an opportunity to catch one of my presentations on The Signal Economy at a recent conference or symposium, or browsed through my presentation slides online. You may have gotten a general grasp of what “signal” means and how a world filled with data being generated online every day by trillions of sensors, mobile devices and Web publishing tools is creating what I call “The Signal Economy” – the generation, collecting, organizing and analysis of signals that drive economic activity predictively at unprecedented scale. Well, that all sounds great at first blush, I assume, otherwise you’d probably not be reading this right now. But what does it really mean to people who are involved in the hard day-to-day work of trying to drive their organization’s revenue streams towards more profitable goals? Is The Signal Economy just another buzz phrase dreamed up by an industry analyst, a fad that will pass away, or is it really a new opportunity for considering how to organize your operations for greater success? My argument that I’ll outline in this paper is that The Signal Economy is far from a fad and is in fact a huge economic opportunity for any organization. I will address most specifically organizations that have a stake in their success through creating and using media and business information sources as a key component in driving their operations. This means not only publishers and media companies, but also any organization that uses information from inside and outside their organization to drive critical decision-making for delivering products and services. In other words, if you’re in pretty much any professional role, listen up – The Signal Economy is about you. You’re either creating signal or consuming signal – or you should be if you want money and success to flow your way.