If you think analytics is just about dashboards and attribution models, Stéphane Hamel is here to ruin your day—in the best possible way.

In this episode of The Skeptical Marketer, Jake sits down with Stéphane Hamel, a digital analytics veteran, ethics advocate, and lecturer at Université Laval. With decades of experience and a sharp outsider’s lens, Stéphane isn’t afraid to ask the tough questions: Who benefits from your marketing data? What are the hidden trade-offs in automation? And why does the industry keep confusing “more data” with “better decisions”?

This is a conversation about ethics, incentives, and the systems we’ve blindly accepted.

Key takeaways & lessons:

1. The illusion of objectivity: Stéphane unpacks how data is never neutral—it reflects the assumptions, biases, and motivations of those who collect and interpret it.
2. Marketing’s moral blind spot: Expect a frank discussion about consent theatre, tracking culture, and the lack of ethical frameworks guiding how brands use data to influence behaviour.
3. When Google owns the scoreboard: Stéphane and Jake dive into the anti-trust concerns around Google’s dominance in ad tech—and why performance metrics might be more about protecting the platform than serving the marketer.
4. Why GA4 broke trust: Hear why even seasoned analysts are walking away from Google Analytics, and what it signals about the future of measurement.
5. Accountability in an automated world: With AI, automation, and opaque systems becoming the norm, Stéphane challenges marketers to think beyond efficiency—and start asking who’s left behind.

Stéphane Hamel’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shamel

Université Laval’s Website: https://www.ulaval.ca/

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