Case questions

1. What is their business strategy to grow profitably and compete over the long term? * Get customer data from whatever sources are available, loading it onto our systems and analyzing it * Put together products that will appeal to different types of people, by testing whether hypotheses are right, looking at the result of these tests, modifying the hypotheses and testing again, and so on * It is all centered around understanding and analyzing information * Capital One can address a much wider group of potential credit card customers, offering credit facilities to individuals who traditional card companies regard as high risk * To do so, it Aggregates as much data as possible on customers - from credit checking information to lists of people's hobbies

2. Describe how Capital One uses information to implement their strategy? What kinds of information do they use and where does it come from (sources)? * The slab of plastic is the key to an information machine—a machine fueled by data on who you are, what sort of people you live among, whether you’ll carry a balance or avoid finance charges at all costs. * This data machine may offer the closest thing ever invented to perpetual motion, because the more you use the card, the more data it produces. * The machine takes your bytes, combines them with transactions by millions of other cardholders—and before long, it can pinpoint what you’re likely to buy next, whether you’ll respond to a pitch for long-distance telephone service, and how likely you are to sign up for Internet banking. * Based on what is known, the company constantly make new hypothesis, experiment, measure, and analyze the data * And add these data to what is known and make changes for improvements

3. Describe their notion of a “scientific test”. Compare and contrast this approach