Decision
Anton Buchner, Founder, Front Foot Marketing Last updated 8 August 2026
What decision are we actually trying to make?
The question behind the question
What does the data say?
What decision is the data supposed to support?
The straight answer
This is often the question that should come first.
A business can spend weeks analysing data without ever clearly defining the decision that analysis is supposed to support.
The deeper answer
Should we increase investment? Change the proposition? Enter a new market? Change agencies? Target a different customer? Stop doing something?
Those are different decisions. They require different evidence.
Before asking what the data says, ask what decision you're actually trying to make.
The wrong question can produce a lot of very impressive analysis, and still leave you exactly where you started.
The uncomfortable bit
Most of the analysis sitting in most strategy decks was never attached to a specific decision. It was attached to a slide.
What we know
- The data everyone's been pulling and presenting
- Roughly which options are on the table
What we don't
- Whether everyone in the room is actually answering the same question
- Which of those options the evidence in hand can genuinely speak to
What we need to decide anyway: What decision you're actually making, in one sentence, before any more analysis gets commissioned.
What I'd challenge
I'd challenge the idea that more analysis is always progress. Sometimes it's just a well-documented way of not deciding.
When I'd say don't do this
Should you commission another round of research? Maybe. But not until you can say, in one sentence, what decision it's meant to inform.
The Anton Test
If I asked five people in this room what decision we're making, would I get five different answers?
What I'd do next
I'd get everyone in the room to write down, independently, what decision they think we're making. Then compare notes before anyone opens a spreadsheet.
The decision
This is ultimately the decision underneath every other decision on this list. Get this one right and the rest gets easier.
This connects to the broader decision on Strategy decisions, if you want the fuller picture.
Better questions. Better evidence. Better judgement. Better marketing decisions.
Keep asking
Related answers
Decision
How much evidence is enough?
You rarely get perfect information. The goal isn't certainty. It's confidence good enough to act.
Decision
What are we assuming that we haven't proved?
Every marketing strategy contains assumptions. The danger is forgetting they're assumptions.
Effectiveness
Is this actually a marketing problem?
Sometimes the problem wearing a marketing hat isn't a marketing problem.
Still working out what the real question is?
Sometimes the hardest part isn't finding the answer. It's knowing which question to ask.