Expanding data literacy to include data preparation: building a sound marketing analytics foundation

The current digital landscape is evolving at an increasingly rapid pace where “data is the new oil” of the global economy. Like oil, extracting value from raw data is a complex process as it is not useful in its raw state. As data continue to be generated and relied upon, data literacy skills are becoming increasingly critical. Since data must be ‘prepared’ prior to its analysis, this paper highlights three core competencies—cleaning, transforming, merging (i.e., data preparation)—that are required to build a sound marketing analytics foundation. Expanding data literacy to include the ability to transform data from its raw state into a usable form will enhance students’ overall level of proficiency and marketability in marketing analytics. It is imperative to include the teaching of data preparation as part of the analytics curriculum in marketing analytics courses to ensure that students attain the greater level of data literacy. Data preparation assignments that will help students enhance their marketing analytics skillset, and increase their overall knowledge and marketability are included.