Data Analysis & Decision Making Flashcards
7 cards from real MAC practice questions. Tap to flip, then mark Knew It or Still Learning — missed cards come back until you master them.
Read the first 7 Data Analysis & Decision Making flashcards as text
A decision matrix is used in marketing analytics primarily to:
Answer: Systematically evaluate and compare options across multiple weighted criteria
A decision matrix scores and weights multiple criteria to objectively compare options and support structured decision-making.
An analyst building a predictive churn model finds it achieves 95% accuracy on the training set but only 62% on a holdout test set. This pattern most likely indicates:
Answer: The model is overfitting the training data and will not generalize well
A large gap between training and test accuracy is a classic sign of overfitting, where the model memorizes training data rather than learning generalizable patterns.
Which visualization type is most effective for displaying the distribution of a continuous variable such as customer purchase value?
Answer: Histogram
A histogram groups continuous data into bins and shows the frequency distribution, making it ideal for visualizing spread, skew, and outliers.
In the context of marketing analytics, what does 'incrementality' measure?
Answer: The additional conversions caused specifically by a marketing activity beyond what would have occurred organically
Incrementality isolates the lift attributable to a specific marketing action, separating it from organic or baseline conversions.
A marketing analyst is asked to prioritize three campaign optimizations with limited budget. Which framework is most appropriate for this decision?
Answer: Effort-impact prioritization matrix
An effort-impact matrix plots tasks by required effort versus expected impact, helping teams focus resources on high-impact, low-effort actions.
When should an analyst use median rather than mean to describe central tendency in a dataset?
Answer: When the distribution is skewed or contains significant outliers
The median is resistant to outliers and skewed distributions, making it a more representative measure of center in non-normal data.
A brand launches a new product and tracks weekly sales. After 8 weeks the data shows a consistent upward trend with seasonal dips every weekend. Which forecasting method best accounts for both components?
Answer: Triple exponential smoothing (Holt-Winters method)
Holt-Winters triple exponential smoothing models trend and seasonality simultaneously, making it well-suited for data with both patterns.