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For those of you that are unfamiliar with the term, DRY is a software development term that stands for “Don’t Repeat Yourself”. This is a fundamental part of good development that ensures efficiency. It is also something that I have found is often missing from reporting processes. I believe that the lack of DRY reporting is two sided. On the one hand, the people compiling reports often lack the required programming experience to automate repetitive tasks.

There are three key aspects that differentiate a good report from a bad one. All of which are determined well before the first piece of data is even looked at. The problem with most reports, and the reason that they end up being a waste of everyone’s time, is that these three aspects are often brushed aside or completely ignored. The three questions that need to be answered before any report is started are:

This is my first attempt at sharing some of my work and some of the lessons that I’ve learnt over the past 8 years as a digital analyst. I hopefully it will be of some benefit to you. I hope to write a number of articles about digital measurement and implementing custom tracking. However, I believe it is only prudent to start at the beginning. And in my opinion, the beginning is not as much a question of how, as it is of what.