What Counts? The Dangerous Power of Numbers

Anna Thairs

Argues that campaign statistics in the UK should be investigated with the aim to improve them, rather than simply aiming for them.

In his 1997 book Whose Reality Counts? Robert Chambers, himself an economist wrote:

Economists have come to feel What can’t be measured, isn’t real. The truth is always an amount — Count numbers; only numbers count.

20 years on, is Chambers still right? If so, does it matter? If so, what can be done about it?

Replace ‘economists’ with ‘marketers’ and, 20 years on, Chambers has hit the nail on the head.

The communications industry has become over-reliant on headline-grabbing numbers, short-term metrics and a ‘target achieved’ mentality, which has led to us...

WARC subscribers can sign in to keep reading

Not a subscriber?

Schedule your live demo with our team today

WARC helps you to plan, create and deliver more effective marketing

  • Prove your case and back-up your idea

  • Get expert guidance on strategic challenges

  • Tackle current and emerging marketing themes

We’re long-term subscribers to WARC and it’s a tool we use extensively. We use it to source case studies and best practice for the purposes of internal training, as well as for putting persuasive cases to clients. In compiling a recent case for long-term, sustained investment in brand, we were able to support key marketing principles with numerous case studies sourced from WARC. It helped bring what could have been a relatively dry deck to life with recognisable brand successes from across a broad number of categories. It’s incredibly efficient to have such a wealth of insight in one place.

Insights Team
Bray Leino

You’re in good company

We work with 80% of Forbes' most valuable brands* and 80% of the world's top top-of-the-class agencies.

* Top 10 brands