Harnessing the Power of Data To Drive Business Growth With Luke Komiskey

Luke Komiskey is the Founder and CEO of DataDrive, a consulting firm specializing in managed analytic services. With over a decade of experience, Luke has played a pivotal role in making data analytics more accessible to various businesses. Under his leadership, DataDrive has evolved into a global team of professionals, supporting over 150 organizations across healthcare, public education, manufacturing, and software. Luke’s approach emphasizes transforming data into actionable insights, aiding organizations in making faster and more informed decisions. His passion for simplifying complex data challenges has been central to DataDrive’s mission of fostering a data-informed society.

Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn:

• [03:39] Luke Komiskey shares what they do at DataDrive
• [05:07] How to use data analytics for marketing and sales insights
• [07:57] Why self-service analytics is important for agencies
• [10:56] Use cases of data to create a dashboard or generate insights
• [12:25] How DataDrive helps school districts
• [19:14] Luke talks about the evolution of DataDrive’s client base and services
• [23:53] How the pandemic changed DataDrive’s scope engagements
• [25:23] The value of technology partnerships and remote work in attracting top talent
• [28:16] What Luke does to maintain a positive remote work culture
• [30:25] Why Luke decided to take a six-month trip around the world

In this episode…

In an age where data is abundant, the challenge lies in harnessing its true power to drive business growth. How can organizations transform raw data into actionable insights that propel them forward? This pivotal question lies at the heart of today’s data-driven business landscape.

According to Luke Komiskey, a seasoned expert in data analytics, the answer lies in skillfully navigating the complexities of data. He highlights the importance of not just collecting data but analyzing and utilizing it effectively to make informed decisions. By weaving stories out of numbers, Luke illustrates how data can lead to more efficient processes, informed decision-making, and significant business growth. His approach demonstrates the transformational impact of data analytics across various industries, from healthcare to education, underscoring its role as a cornerstone of modern business success.

In this episode of the Inspired Insider Podcast, Dr. Jeremy Weisz is joined by Luke Komiskey, Founder and CEO of DataDrive, to delve into the role of data in driving business success. They explore how DataDrive’s analytics solutions aid organizations in a variety of industries, Luke’s personal journey from global traveler to data analytics leader, and the impact of remote work culture on modern business operations.

Resources mentioned in this episode:

• Luke Komiskey on LinkedIn
• DataDrive

Special Mention(s):

• Entrepreneurs’ Organization (EO)
• Tableau
• Traction: Get A Grip On Your Business by Gino Wickman
• The Gap and The Gain: The High Achievers’ Guide to Happiness, Confidence, and Success by Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin Hardy
• EOS Entrepreneurial Operating System
• Rocket Fuel: The One Essential Combination That Will Get You More of What You Want from Your Business by Gino Wickman and Mark C. Winters

Related episode(s):

• “EO Tulsa | Real Estate Investment With Mat Zalk of Keyrenter Property Management” on the Inspired Insider Podcast 
• “How to Sell More And Save Time with Robert Hartline of Absolute Wireless” on the Inspired Insider Podcast
• “[EO Chicago] Innovating Online Marketing Strategies for Law Firms With Rafi Arbel” on the Rising Entrepreneurs Podcast
• “Leading with Passion with Gino Wickman Founder of EOS Worldwide” on the Inspired Insider Podcast

Quotable Moments: 

• “There’s new revenue streams within that type of data monetization that particularly media agencies and marketing agencies can absolutely take advantage of.”
• “Unless you have somebody that is going into all these individual systems and pulling multiple years of data, you’ll never be able to see those insights really easily.”
• “The biggest value that people get into — just whether it’s consulting or any kind of agency — is you get the opportunity to be exposed to many different organizations.”
• “Once you make it to the top, send the elevator back down.”
• “The most random stories and shared experiences that people provide completely unlock a new way of thinking.”

Episode Transcript

Intro  0:01 

You are listening to Inspired Insider with your host, Dr. Jeremy Weisz.

Jeremy Weisz  0:22 

Dr. Jeremy Weisz here founder of inspiredinsider.com where I talk with inspirational entrepreneurs and leaders today is no different. I’ve Luke Komiskey of godatadrive.com. Luke, before I formally introduce you, I always like to point out other episodes, people should check out the podcast. Since Luke is actually in EO, Minnesota if you don’t know what is Entrepreneurs Organization, that great group of entrepreneurs founders getting together help each other. I had Matt Zalk, who’s an EO Tulsa and he talked about growing his company and a Key Renter and EO Nashville, Robert Hartline. He talked about growing a chain of actually cell phone stores from scratch to over $100 million. And also he has a software company as well talked about that journey and EO Chicago member, Rafi Arbel Market JD talks about how he grew his agency. He was a lawyer, he actually went on to get his MBA and how he grew his agency that helps lawyer so those are all interesting, check him out. inspiredinsider.com This episode is brought to you by Rise25. Rise25 we help businesses give to and connect their dream 100 relationships. And how do we do that we actually do that by helping you run your podcast. We’re an easy button for a company to launch or on a podcast we do the strategy, the accountability and the full execution around the podcast. Luke, we call ourselves the magic elves that work in the background and make it look easy for the host and the company so that they can create great content and amazing relationships. For me, the number one thing in my life is relationships. I’m always looking at ways to give to my best relationships. And I found no better way over the past decade to profile the people in companies I most admire and share with the world what they’re working on. And I met Luke at one of the conferences actually in Entrepreneurs Organization. I’m like, Luke, you must come on my podcast to talk about what you’re doing. He’s got a really interesting, crazy story even from traveling around the world to how he started his company. So we’re gonna get into that. But if you’ve thought about podcasting, you should if you have questions, go to rise25.com to learn more, and I’ll saying I’m excited to introduce Luke Komiskey. He’s the founder and CEO of DataDrive, you can find him at godatadrive.com. And DataDrive is a data consulting firm, providing managed analytic services. Well, we’ll talk about what that means. And DataDrive helps growing midsize organizations transform their data into insights, which is the most important what do you do with your data? How do you make decisions with your data, right? Because it’s all there. But we need to provide action and insight. So that’s what they help people do. And organizations do. They have an ongoing partnership with companies to provide both the data platform and the team for delivering the faster and informed decisions. And over the last seven years, Luke’s grown DataDrive into a worldwide team of highly skilled professionals serving over 150 organizations. They’ve worked with organizations, from healthcare to public school systems, to manufacturing to software companies, and more. Luke, thanks for joining me.

Luke Komiskey  3:26 

Thanks for having me. Fantastic introduction.

Jeremy Weisz  3:29 

So just talk for a little bit, we’ll dig into what you do a little bit, but just tell people a little bit more about DataDrive in what you do.

Luke Komiskey  3:39 

Yeah, DataDrive, like you mentioned, we are a data analytics consultancy, but really specialized around that whole concept of managed analytic services. And the whole idea of that as organizations are very familiar with collecting data, entering data, bringing on new applications within their business to bring that data and have their people input data into everything about their business process. But what most companies struggle with is what are we doing with all of this data? And how is it actually driving informed insights and faster decision-making for how we’re gonna go to market? And so what we really help organizations with is business leaders who are trying to figure out how to make sense of what they’ve been collecting over the year, can it be brought together, we are the easy button for being able to bring on an experienced data team that already has experienced setting up these end to end systems and how to analyze and pull interesting insights out of your data. That we bring all of that through a managed service that provides that ongoing support to help grow the internal skill sets, but also manage all of the data moving around between these disparate systems within companies.

Jeremy Weisz  4:46 

Well, let’s talk about an example. So we can kind of just get some clarity for people. Because we all have data and we all want to have more insights and action. You help the media agency. Talk about some of the things you did there. I’ve had a lot of agencies on the podcast that will be interested to hear what you did with his media agency.

Luke Komiskey  5:07 

Yeah, yeah, media marketing agencies are definitely great examples of companies that have a lot of disparate data that’s sitting out in various systems. If you think about how the operations run of digital media that sits and things like Facebook, and LinkedIn, and Google ads, all the way to traditional media about how radio and TV spots are bought, or how a billboard is actually has any kind of advertising on it. All of that is data that sits in very different systems, either because the vendor is running that system, or your team is having to devise in the end, the real results and outcomes of that data. And for a media company, a big media marketing agency is a big part of that is being able to share that story of when I spend $1, of marketing with your organization that I get, hopefully more than $1 of value back from it. And so media marketing agencies, leverage us to piece together all of these disparate data sources, take all the plan data, all the actual spend all the impressions that are gained from it, and being able to tell a story of the marketing value that their clients are getting from their services. But even more specifically for leaders that are running their own agency is think about all the time that your team is having to spend stuck within Excel spreadsheets and Google Sheets trying to manually create this on a monthly, weekly ongoing basis. Imagine if you could automate that story and be able to share that almost real-time with your customers. That’s where the value of our service comes.

Jeremy Weisz  6:42 

So a lot of times, if you’re listening to audio, there is a video piece and we’re looking at godatadrive.com. You can see, here’s their website, but the case studies, one of them is media company. I know you helped a lot of media companies, but they can actually use it as a way like from a sales perspective and a marketing perspective, because they may not know exactly, they go we know we’re getting results, we know we’re getting a certain times whatever row as or certain return on spend, but we don’t know exactly what that is. And you help them figure that out. That’s one example I guess, of have you how they figure it out. And they use that in their marketing and sales.

Luke Komiskey  7:25 

Yeah, so two different ways, right? You can either gain the efficiencies of not having to have a team manually pull all this data and piece together for weekly monthly presentations. There’s a time-saving element of it.

Jeremy Weisz  7:36 

So they may use it with their current clients also, yeah, absolutely not just so from a sales and marketing, hey, this is what we get. But maybe they have a monthly meeting with our clients. And they don’t want to have to pull all the data and you basically do it, give them a nice presentation. And they’re off to the races. And they just focus on the client.

Luke Komiskey  7:57 

Yeah, and it’s incredibly self-service that these teams can actually pull presentations at any given time without anyone from our side having to support that the data is constantly being flowing in that it removes all of that manual intervention of data that so many organizations kind of build entire teams around the copy and pasting of data. I think the second piece that we’ve actually seen a lot more particularly over the last two years is this concept of data monetization. So organizations are recognizing that they’re sitting on a goldmine of insights of whatever their business model may be, but there’s value for their community, whether it’s vendors, partners, external customers, that you can even create value add services of, let me provide interesting insights you to make better decisions. And there’s new revenue streams within that type of data monetization that particularly immediate agencies and marketing agencies can absolutely take advantage of.

Jeremy Weisz  8:51 

So an example of that may be if someone agency serves like an e-commerce niche or something like that, and they can then pull their data and maybe do a white paper or some sort of here’s what we have found the best. I’m making this up, but the best actual terms to advertise for if you’re an e-commerce company, or something like that.

Luke Komiskey  9:17 

Yeah. And that that both touches on something you could sell to an existing customer or even used as a sales tool during new prospect conversations of look at the percent lift that we were able to give to this other customer. And you can experience that same thing and see real-time updates of that through our reporting offering.

Jeremy Weisz  9:35 

But you’ll also it sounds like you’ll set up a platform for them that they can constantly use. So it’s not like they have to call you every time they need to pull report.

Luke Komiskey  9:45 

Yeah, that’s the beauty of what we provide is this concept of self-service analytics. So we are as you can think of us as like data Sherpas behind the scenes that are helping data move from point A to point B and providing that data cleansing and data transformation injecting a little bit of your business logic into how you and your organization look at data. But at the end of the day, we aren’t, position ourselves to be a report factory, we want to provide unlimited access to the data that you have been collecting, but in a more digestible format, so that your business users, your customers will never have to write a line of sequel to try to access their data. They can use click and drag tools to instantly build charts, dashboards, reports that they can self-serve without having to necessarily scale up a bunch of headcount to support all of these new data capabilities.

Jeremy Weisz  10:36 

Yeah, I could see as a leader, as a team, how dashboards can be super powerful. What are some other use cases that people use? So that’s one where they can use it to present to their clients? What are some other use cases of how people are using the data to create a dashboard or insights?

Luke Komiskey  10:56 

Yeah, I mean, it’s very, like dependent on each organization and like the type of insights are looking at, like…

Jeremy Weisz  11:03 

Including agency, like, are there any others from an agency perspective? How they’re using data?

Luke Komiskey  11:08 

Yeah, yeah. So like, outside of just externally reporting, how advertising is creating the lift within the customers’ business. There’s also the internal analysis piece that often isn’t done as an agency that says, are we making the best decision for our customers on how we’re allocating their spend, right? You think about just the media mix and how they’re deciding on which channels to use, which markets to go into, there is a ton of data that is historically sitting out there about what has worked the seasonality of that the year over year performance of that, that unless you have somebody that is going into all these individual systems and pulling multiple years of data, you’ll never be able to see those insights really easily. And so I think there’s a ton, especially for agencies to be able to look internally and say, are we doing the best spend that we possibly can be? Are there ways that we can negotiate with whatever vendor to say we can achieve better? Just even internal efficiency by knowing what works and what doesn’t from a channel perspective.

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