The problem
You make calls all week. Hundreds of them on a full roster. “Scale this one.” “Rework that one.” “Kill it.” How many were right?
Most strategists cannot answer. Not because they were wrong. Because nobody checked.
If you say “scale” and the video makes money, that is a hit. If you say “kill” and it would have made money, that is a miss. Your hit rate is the only real measure of whether you are good at this.
The example
One strategist, one week, 380 calls.
Half the time this strategist says “fix it,” the next version does not help. Either the fix was wrong or the video was never worth another version. Either way, that is the thing to work on. You cannot see it without writing the calls down.
A call is checked when you can see what happened next:
- SCALE: did it keep making money at the same rate as views grew?
- REWORK: did the next version beat the original?
- KILL: did anyone else make the same idea work later?
The world changes while you wait. The brand cuts spend. A competitor launches. The video was a good call on the day and a bad one two weeks later. So write down what the world looked like when you made the call, and when you check, you know whether you were wrong or the ground moved.
Do this in Verdict
- 1Every verdict goes into the ledger on Learnings with a snapshot of the numbers around it that day.
- 2When the next upload comes in, Verdict matches the video and grades the old call by itself. You do not fill anything in.
- 3Your hit rate by call type shows up on the page. If REWORK is your weak spot, you will see it. That is the point.