Are you familiar with the Michael Lewis book Moneyball? Some guy named Brad Pitt also made a movie about it. If you are a baseball fan or a people analytics aficionado, you probably have at least a passing knowledge of the work that popularized the use of data for the purposes of labor arbitrage. That’s the main idea that most of us in Work Tech took away. 

However, there’s a more important lesson that Work Tech sales and marketing pros should take away. The data-driven approach to the game that Moneyball spawned absolutely killed baseball’s customer experience. The use of data tilted the balance of the game in favor of pitching in defense. Teams used data to dial in pitching changes against specific hitters and deploy weird defensive shifts. Offenses tanked. Games took forever to play. Data made it suck to be a fan.

Major League Baseball (MLB) took notice. New rules this year — the pitch clock, limitations on defensive shifts, and larger base sizes — have had an immediate impact. Game times are 30+ minutes shorter, batting averages are higher, and teams are scoring more runs. If you are a fan, it’s a better experience.

Why should you care? The Moneyball approach to Work Tech sales and marketing is destroying the customer experience for buyers. Everyone is using the same playbook and intent data. Data can be used for CX good or ill. We recently spoke with a Work Tech buyer who took a product demo of a Performance Management solution and received calls from 15 other vendors within a few hours. The connect-and-convert sales motion that has been predictable and consistent for the better part of the past 15 years isn’t working anymore. The brands we see doing best are focusing on audience engagement, not forcing sales convos in a tough environment.

Your CX should create a positive perception about the time people spend with your brand. For most Work Tech brands today, that perception is not good. MLB took control of their CX problem. What are you doing about yours?

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