NBA Sports Analytics

by Albert Anthony D. Gavino

This would be good for those Miami and Spurs fans, I used weighted averages of 0.55 for game 2 and 0.45 for game 1, now if it's home court advantage I gave them additional two points. This would be accurate assuming they would be using the same players on the roster and they have the same distributed minutes across game 3, take note that the Statistical forecast was only based on 2 games.

Now let's get back into action!

Excel Forecast for Game 3, SPURS vs Miami June 2014

My personal forecast based on statistics alone is that San Antonio Spurs will win in game 3, now the thing is I forgot to place my bets! 

Facebook Ads and Marketing: How to use it

by Albert Anhony D. Gavino

Have you ever tried one of those small facebook ads that keeps showing on the right side frame of your personal page? I tried one of them using a prepaid Visa card and paid for it. It wasn't much of a turn out but I do realized a few things: one of them is to use an ad with only twenty percent text and eighty percent visuals, so if you have an ad make sure your visuals are catchy! I do hope Facebook Data Science isn't tracking what ads I click on! Imagine if they were tracking that I was clicking on lingerie ads for my wife, ads that are related to that will show up on my right side image. 

Getting back to the topic, I should have made at least six different ads to work on, so I could see which ad really works! The third thing is that I should have targeted the following demographics: managers, CEO's, product managers and the like, because these people have the budget (always have in mind your target demographic)

FB Ad of 20% text, 80% image

Another thing to keep in mind is when to post: I usually recommend the time frame above 5 pm, 12:00 noon and the time before 8:00 am (these are the times when people check on facebook and when people click on likes and comment on it, it's most likely to trend). Also keep on mind days like Fridays and Weekends are high because people like to use Ipads and look for things to do on the weekend, It can be a weekend sale, a sales promotions for a restaurant, a meetup event that's discounted for the first 50 registrants.

East West Visa Prepaid Card, Buying apps online

by Albert Anthony D. Gavino

I am generally happy with this East West Visa Prepaid Card, I was able to buy apps for my Ipad Mini, buy a ticket at Event Brite, Pay a facebook ad, buy a Casio Edifice Watch from Great Value Plus and even link it to my Paypal Account. I use my Paypal account to do freelance tasks and get paid with it, it usually takes 3 days before the amount is reflected to your local bank, I do like to thank Mr. Jun Segismundo for helping me out with this card also.

East West Prepaid Card

For more information about the card, you can visit the East West Branch at Taft Avenue, it's just across the De La Salle - Andrew Building and Archer's place. Take note that if you inquire on your ATM/ Prepaid card, you get billed one peso for it, but what's nice about it is that you can withdraw your pre-loaded money that you spent on the card. Now that's customer service!

Analytics on one of the most downloaded apps (Apptivate)

Apptivate for Downloading apps (TechinAsia)

Apptivate lets you buy IOS apps through your mobile phone with Globe or with a prepaid card, Jay Norris of Apptivate approached me in one event/seminar entitled Ninja Branding and wanted to have his data analyzed, it turned out I was able to do some stats on it and voila!

Here is an excerpt of it:

• Customers who are more likely to purchase an app log in only once and purchase.
• Customers who login more than three times are likely not to buy any apps.
• Gender is not an issue when buying apps
• Age demographic is not an issue when buying apps
  (data that we have only ranged up to age 40+ max)
• Apps prices were market segmented into the following
  (apps at 1 dollar, apps at 2 dollars and apps priced above 2 dollars)

However from this on, I never heard any news from Jay Norris of Apptivate, probably because he is busy working out projects from other service providers to grow his business.

Photo credit from TechinAsia

If you want a free analytics consultation on your start up just e-mail me at bert.gavino@yahoo.com or add me at Facebook: Albert Anthony D. Gavino. I do this for Research and to drive start ups for Philippines!

Start Up Grind Sessions (a beginning for Start up Analytics)

Start up Grind for Entrepreneurs

I recently went to one of Google's Start up Grind Sessions with Dustin Masancay handling the event, it was a great event with a lot of really cool people. Imagine a mini Silicon Valley gathering at the Microsoft Center. Jessica Mah indicated that there was a need to concentrate on metrics and analytics that will be good for the business instead of concentrating on your media coverage and your number of users. At the end of the day, you need to have that analytics working for you to make some profits. I personally don't think that Google Analytics alone can help you predict your customers but it's a starting point. Predicting your next sale based on your users help you turn that visitor into your customer and that's what drives your business. Get constant feedback from your customers and work with your developers in giving that utmost customer experience that they want and you get a good business platform.

By the way here are the pictures from the event courtesy of the great team of Dustin Masancay of Start up Grind Manila, Idea Space and Indinero.com

Start up Grind Values: Make Friends, Help Each Other, Give

Jessica Mah of Indinero.com

Lessons to be made from the Start up GRIND Session

1. Be ready with a short video about your company and your product
2. Pitch for two minutes to convince the audience you have a great IDEA and a great business
3. Get feedback from the audience, it will help you strengthen your Start up Business
4. Start making friends (not contacts) who can help you out with your business

It was a really cool event! Hope to join the other session by June!

for more information about Analytics for Start ups
e-mail me @ albertanthony.gavino@benilde.edu.ph

pictures courtesy of Startup GRIND Manila

Ten things that make of a Successful Start Up

I learned this by gathering data from reports and found out the following:

1. CEO's that have CEO friends are more likely to succeed with their Start Up.
2. Start ups that pivot up to two times maximum are more likely to succeed
3. CEO's that have not been influenced by traditional ways are more likely to think of disruptive ideas that lead to bright products and services
4. A great team will help in the success of the Start up
5. Failing to expand at the correct time will result in the failure of the start up
6. Ability to differentiate oneself from the other companies.
7. Attending seminars and exposing oneself to trends abroad increases innovation to the start up
8. Listening to customer's feedback is of utmost importance and leads to the overall success of the product and service.
9. Being able to address customer complaints leads to the overall Brand Reputation
10. Targeting the right clients gives better market reach.

Somehow there are other variables that we can look into and be tested through statistical tests such as the Debt Equity of Owners, how many months it took for them to expand (through number of customers or number of orders or number of registered accounts) the Online World is very different from the Traditional Business Setting and somehow changes from time to time through what we do everyday.

Top ten things why I stick to my old phone

These are the top things why I stick to my old phone...

1. I use it only for calls and text messaging
2. thieves don't want it
3. It fits in my pocket
4. battery lasts for five days
5. I don't have to do a selfie
6. I don't have to worry about new software updates
7. It doesn't make me buy new apps.
8. I don't have to worry about WIFI
9. It doesn't need a case and lastly...
10. It goes against trends!

My Old Nokia Phone

Teaching Analytics at Benilde

by Albert Anthony D. Gavino, MBA

BAFBANI class at Benilde

It was my first time to teach students at Benilde, I wasn't sure if I would be able to teach the fundamentals. I read the course syllabus and said to myself its all biased towards IBM, I should be teaching them the fundamentals of it (with some nervousness and uncertainty on how to teach the elective course) I just delved into it!

I made the course out of the box from the typical classroom, we had group activities (from market basket analysis to time series) I did not force them to learn all of it and we had some guest speakers a total of five from all different industries to let them see how it's like in the real world.

To sum it all, the students did learn, they had their IBM-Cognos dashboards ready, they were able to answer the final exams and they were able to get insights on how to use analytics for their advantage. I think I did a good job on it.  At the rate of 500 pesos an hour, it wasn't so bad after all.

Who is Thomas Bayes?

Ever since the Malaysian Air flight has been missing, Statisticians went back to Bayes theory,

I like to put a special event for this day as to remind us who Thomas Bayes was!

The English theologian and mathematician Thomas Bayes has greatly contributed to the field of probability and statistics. His ideas have created much controversy and debate among statisticians over the years.
Thomas Bayes was born in 1702 in London, England. Bayes's father was one of the first six Nonconformist ministers to be ordained in England. (4) Bayes's parents had their son privately educated. There is no information about the tutors Bayes worked with. However, there has been speculation that he was taught by de Moivre.

Still to put it, he was one who revolutionized Statistics with conditional probability and this algorithm is being used by advance software tools in the industry today from B.I. tools to Predictive Analytics.

Dr. Siegel and Predictive Analytics 2014

Predictive Analytics by Dr. Siegel
Cross-Industry, Cross-Vendor Sessions

The only conference of its kind, Predictive Analytics World delivers vendor-neutral sessions across verticals such as banking, financial services, e-commerce, entertainment, government, healthcare, high technology, insurance, non-profits, publishing, and retail.

And PAW covers the gamut of commercial applications of predictive analytics, includingresponse modeling, customer retention with churn modeling, product recommendations, online marketing optimization, behavior-based advertising, fraud detection, insurance pricing and credit scoring.

Why bring together such a wide range of endeavors? No matter how you use predictive analytics, the story is the same: Predictively scoring customers and other organizational elements optimizes business performance. Predictive analytics initiatives across industries leverage the same core predictive modeling technology, share similar project overhead and data requirements, and face common process challenges and analytical hurdles.

The Cross-Vendor Summit:

• Meet the vendors and learn about their solutions, software and services
• Discover the best predictive analytics vendors available to serve your needs
• Learn what they do and see how they compare.

Valuable Colleagues:

• Mingle, network and hang out with your best and brightest colleagues
• Exchange experiences over lunch, breaks and the conference reception, connecting with those professionals who face the same challenges as you.

Creating GEO Maps using Google Fusion Tables

by Albert Anthony D. Gavino

January 28, 2014

I just started teaching a class Fundamentals to Business Analytics every Mondays and Wednesdays from 04:20 to 05:50 pm. I guess there are a lot of topics to cover and yet so little time to teach the students given only 14 Weeks. Anyhow I was able to introduce them to Google Analytics, IBM-Cognos Insight for Dashboards, Google APIs for making pie charts, bar graphs and Motion Charts and just recently Geographical maps using Google Fusion Tables.

Have you Ever tried making a GEO MAP? its quite easy, you just need additional variables such as Latitude and Longitude and this will be mapped to a tab under your google spreadsheet.

Google GEO maps

to use the spreadsheet, I made it available to public consumption and access it here:
https://www.google.com/fusiontables/DataSource?docid=1FKYKWJdCuzHnnjFXkBOapt2aoL-a0e5Q4xpRlho

You may also link it to other tables by joining them and come up with awesome GEO maps.

Google fusion tables may be accessed at www.google.com/fusiontables/

Big Data vs Small Data (why our Stat traditional teachers are against it)

by Albert Anthony D. Gavino

Parametric vs Non-Parametric, Small Data vs Big Data,
Who is the more superior race?

The traditional "parametric" tests, such as t-tests and the analysis of variance, assume the population(s) to be normally distributed; they generally assume that one's measures derive from an equal-interval scale. 

Non-parametric tests involve non-normal distributions, some of which are the following: 

• multi forms of chi-square tests

• Fisher Exact Probability test

• Mann-Whitney Test

• Wilcoxon Signed-Rank Test

•  Kruskal-Wallis Test

• and the Friedman Test

In the field of Big Data, Non-parametric is the higher science and the more powerful one, as noted by one of the UP professors.

We no longer assume that distributions are normal and we can’t use t-tests or ANOVA for that matter.

The book has arrived!

Predictive Analytics Book by Eric Siegel

Finally the book I requested from Prediction Impact has arrived! this package was sent by my good friend Bobbe Cook from the Marketing Dept of Predictive Analytics World through UPS shipping at $20.15 and the book price at $28.00. (a thumbs up to these guys!)

Fortunately I got it all for free for being a Predictive Analytics World

Blog Partner, a partnership program by the Prediction Impact Inc.
to reach through the Asian Countries.

Package delivered on Sept 26, 2013

The book is a hard bound type with glossy pages

Front Cover

"What Nate Silver did for poker and politics, this does for everything else, A broad, well-written book easily accessible to non-nerd readers"-DAVID LEINWEBER, author of Nerds on Wall Street: Math, Machines and Wired Markets

"This is Moneyball for business, government, and healthcare"
-JIM STERNE, founder, eMetrics Summit; chairman, Digital Analytics Association

Back Cover of the Book

Some of its pages are in colored print and glossy paper material,

I can't wait to read all the chapters from Mortgage Risks, to the Ensemble Effect, Crowd-sourcing and Persuasion by the Numbers: How Telenor, U.S. Bank and the Obama Campaign engineered Influence (that's an Uplift!) Geeky as it sounds this book is for beginners and is friendly to 

starters for Predictive Analytics.

Inside Pages of the book

If you want to buy the book, its available through the ff:

    

    

6716 Cascade Rd., D10

Grand Rapids, MI 49546

12th National Convention on Statistics

The Philippine Statistical System (PSS) through the National Statistical Coordination Board (NSCB) invites you to participate in the 12th National Convention on Statistics (NCS) which will be held on 1-2 October 2013 at EDSA Shangri-La Hotel, Mandaluyong City.

Day 1 – October 1, 2013 (Tuesday)

7:00 – 8:45	Registration
8:45 – 9:00	Ribbon Cutting of the Statistical Information Management Exhibit (SIMEX) 2013
9:00 – 10:00	JOINT OPENING CEREMONIES of the 24th National Statistics Month and 12th National Convention on Statistics (Isla Ballroom) Welcome Remarks: Jose Ramon G. Albert NSCB Secretary General Keynote Address:  Senate President Franklin Drillon
10:10 – 10:30	Coffee Break
10:30 – 12:15	Plenary Session 1 (Isla Ballroom)1   Accelerating Inclusive Growth and Competitiveness through Statistics Session Organizer: Prof. Solita Collas-Monsod    Presenters: Mr. Guillermo Luz Dr. Josef T. Yap Discussant: Dr. Johannes Jutting
12:15 – 1:15	Lunch Break
1:15 – 2:45	Simultaneous Scientific Sessions (10 sessions)
2:50 – 4:20	Simultaneous Scientific Sessions (10 sessions)
4:25 – 4:40	Coffee Break
4:40 – 6:10	Simultaneous Sessions (10 sessions)

Day 2 – October 2, 2013 (Wednesday)

8:30 – 10:00	Simultaneous Scientific Sessions  (10 sessions)
10:00 – 10:15	Coffee Break
10:15 – 12:00	Plenary Session 2 (Isla Ballroom)2 Social media and statistics (big data, organic data and privacy) Session Organizer: Dr. Corinne Grace Burgos Presenters: Mr. Johannes Jutting Dr. Jose Ramon G. Albert Ms. Jeanette Beltran
12:00 – 1:00	Lunch Break
1:00 – 2:30	Simultaneous Scientific Sessions (10 sessions)
2:35 – 4:20	Plenary Session 3 (Isla Ballroom) Managing risks to development (disaster and financial risk management, social protection, food security) Session Organizer: Asst. Secretary Lila Shahani Presenters: Asst. Secretary Romeo Recide Gov. Jose Clemente "Joey" Salceda
4:20 – 4:35	Coffee Break
4:35 – 5:00	CLOSING CEREMONY of the 12th NCS (Isla Ballroom)

Root Mean Square Error Approximation (RMSEA) and WARP PLS

by Albert Anthony D. Gavino, MBA

Model fit is one important aspect in the field of SEM, otherwise known as Structural Equation Modeling, RMSEA or Root Mean Square Error Approximation is a test if our data is a good fit to the model, with experts saying an acceptable value is less than 0.05.

There are two software programs used by my colleagues in this certain field, one of them is IBM-SPSS AMOS and another is WARP PLS using Partial Least Squares Method, these are deemed popular among Moderation and Mediation experts, the WARP PLS is recommended for users who would want a deeper insight into their moderation variables, while the IBM-SPSS AMOS software is good for researchers looking into mediation variables, Nevertheless both software are powerful for the Researcher and provides them a good tool into coming with the best model.

I guess this is what happens when your colleagues are statistical nerds, Psychometricians and highly cognitive people who just have fun with RMSEA values and Structural Equation Modeling.

Predictive Analytics World Upcoming Events this Sept to Nov 2013

Predictive Analytics World is the business-focused event for predictive analytics professionals, managers and commercial practitioners, covering today's commercial deployment of predictive analytics, across industries and across software vendors. The conference delivers case studies, expertise, and resources in order to strengthen the business impact delivered by predictive analytics.  

Upcoming Events:

• Predictive Analytics World for Government:Sept 18-19, 2013
• Predictive Analytics World Boston:Sept 29-Oct 3, 2013 
• Text Analytics World Boston:Sept 30-Oct 1, 2013 
• Predictive Analytics World London: Oct 23-24, 2013 
• Predictive Analytics World Berlin: Nov 4-5, 2013

Online Videos on Predictive Analytics

• Predictive Analytics Online Videos

Additional Information:

Please visit www.predictiveanalyticsworld.com and www.textanalyticsworld.com for more information about these events.

EDB singapore and Data Scientists

by Albert Anthony D. Gavino

Would you consider in working in Singapore, Predictive Analytics, Business Intelligence, Analytics ranging from HR, Business, Non-profit and even Medical Science are now the in field when talking about the sexiest occupation in the next two to three years.

the Business Sector Software is controlled by three big names: IBM, SAP and SAS. Background in Statistics, Machine Learning and Databases is most preferred by Companies, and it would be a big help if applicants and beginners get a grasp of the learning concepts such as Logistic Regression, Time Series, Cluster Analysis and Association. Still a lot of open source software are available such as WEKA and Rapid Miner, though free ware are more raw and a bit needs more sharpening compared to the big names. Though that wont hurt but its more power than your Excel spreadsheet software and Pivot Tables.

Global News Network: Big Data Analytics

Just finished with a program Interview on GNN, entitled Big Data Analytics which covers Business Intelligence and Predictive Analytics, it will be aired on Channel 8, Destiny Cable/Sky Cable on Tuesday July 30 from 10 am to 11 am. Mr. Toti Casino is the host and current president of the Philippine Computer Society (PCS)

Predictive Analytics World Conference 2013

Cross-Industry, Cross-Vendor Sessions

The only conference of its kind, Predictive Analytics World delivers vendor-neutral sessions across verticals such as banking, financial services, e-commerce, entertainment, government, healthcare, high technology, insurance, non-profits, publishing, and retail.

And PAW covers the gamut of commercial applications of predictive analytics, includingresponse modeling, customer retention with churn modeling, product recommendations, online marketing optimization, behavior-based advertising, fraud detection, insurance pricing and credit scoring.

Why bring together such a wide range of endeavors? No matter how you use predictive analytics, the story is the same: Predictively scoring customers and other organizational elements optimizes business performance. Predictive analytics initiatives across industries leverage the same core predictive modeling technology, share similar project overhead and data requirements, and face common process challenges and analytical hurdles.

The Cross-Vendor Summit:

• Meet the vendors and learn about their solutions, software and services
• Discover the best predictive analytics vendors available to serve your needs
• Learn what they do and see how they compare.

Valuable Colleagues:

• Mingle, network and hang out with your best and brightest colleagues
• Exchange experiences over lunch, breaks and the conference reception, connecting with those professionals who face the same challenges as you.

Conference scope

Predictive Analytics World's sessions cover business applications of predictive analytics, including:

• Marketing and CRM (offline and online)
  • Response modeling
  • Customer retention with churn modeling
  • Acquisition of high-value customers
  • Direct marketing
  • Database marketing
  • Profiling and cloning
• Online marketing optimization
  • Behavior-based advertising
  • Email targeting
  • Website content optimization
• Product recommendation systems
• Insurance pricing
• Credit scoring
• Fraud detection

Predictive Analytics book by Eric Siegel

by Albert Anthony D. Gavino

For Predictive Analytics newbies, this would be a good book, it discusses analytics in a more simpler way and how companies are using analytics to their advantage.

the book is more on applications instead of the technical know how on predictive analytics.

Predictive Analytics book by Eric Siegel

In this rich, entertaining primer, former Columbia University professor and Predictive Analytics World founder Eric Siegel reveals the power and perils of prediction:

• What type of mortgage risk Chase Bank predicted before the recession.


• Predicting which people will drop out of school, cancel a subscription, or get divorced before they are even aware of it themselves.


• Why early retirement decreases life expectancy and vegetarians miss fewer flights.


• Five reasons why organizations predict death, including one health insurance company.


• How U.S. Bank, European wireless carrier Telenor, and Obama's 2012 campaign calculated the way to most strongly influence each individual.


• How IBM's Watson computer used predictive modeling to answer questions and beat the human champs on TV's Jeopardy!.


• How companies ascertain untold, private truths — how Target figures out you're pregnant and Hewlett-Packard deduces you're about to quit your job.


• How judges and parole boards rely on crime-predicting computers to decide who stays in prison and who goes free.


• What's predicted by the BBC, Citibank, ConEd, Facebook, Ford, Google, IBM, the IRS, Match.com, MTV, Netflix, Pandora, PayPal, Pfizer, and Wikipedia.

Buy the Book: