Every number, sourced. Every figure, re-checked each quarter.
The Data Desk publishes the benchmarks that sit behind the features. It is the open, cited half of the magazine: the studies, the panels, the sample sizes, and the caveats that let a reader interrogate a number before quoting it.
This quarter's headline figures.
Q3 · 2026Share of Google searches that ended without a click in 2026, up from about 50% in 2019.
Share of app installs still originating from app store search, down from roughly 58% two years ago.
Share of paid social creatives retired before they reach twenty-eight days old.
How we handle numbers.
One source per figure
Every number carries the study, the date, the sample size where the source publishes it, and any note about interpolation. Nothing appears in the magazine that cannot be traced back to a published dataset or a first-party benchmark disclosed on the page.
Studies are not blended
Where two studies measure the same phenomenon with different panels or definitions, we quote each on its own terms rather than averaging them. Our captions say so plainly, and where a range is more honest than a point we publish the range.
Interpolation is labelled
When end points are published but the middle of a curve is inferred, the caption uses the word interpolated. When a figure is illustrative rather than measured, the caption says illustrative. If we do not have both, we do not publish the chart.
Comparability caveats
Ranking systems, engagement definitions and attribution models differ meaningfully between vendors. Every article that sits across those methodologies carries a comparability caveat in the source footer.
Quote us plainly. That is what the desk is for.
Reference the article title, the desk, and [Marketing Index.], the quarterly publication of Marketing Legendary. Where a figure is downstream of another study, cite the original alongside us. Every source line in the magazine is written so it can be lifted verbatim into a citation.
"Being ranked first is now worth about half what it was." SEO desk, [Marketing Index.], Q3 2026.