Cogny vs Looker Studio: AI Agent vs Free Dashboard Tool

Question

Should I use Cogny or Looker Studio (formerly Google Data Studio) for marketing analytics?

Answer

Looker Studio is a free dashboard tool that visualizes your data.

Cogny is an AI agent that analyzes your data and tells you exactly what to do.

Looker Studio shows you charts. Cogny gives you answers.

At a Glance Comparison

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Core Difference: AI vs Visualization

Looker Studio: Dashboard Builder

Looker Studio (formerly Google Data Studio) is Google's free dashboard tool.

What it does:

• Connects to data sources (Google Ads, GA4, BigQuery, etc.)
• Lets you build charts and graphs
• Creates shareable dashboards
• Refreshes data automatically

What it's good at:

• Making data look pretty
• Executive reporting
• Client presentations
• Sharing metrics with stakeholders

What it doesn't do:

• Analyze your data
• Tell you what's wrong
• Recommend what to fix
• Generate insights

The process:

1. Connect data sources
2. Build dashboard (1-3 hours)
3. Look at charts
4. Try to spot patterns
5. Figure out what it means
6. Decide what to do
7. Repeat weekly

You're still doing all the analysis.

Cogny: AI Analysis Agent

Cogny is an AI agent that analyzes your marketing data.

What it does:

• Connects to your data sources
• AI analyzes everything automatically
• Generates specific, actionable tickets
• Tells you exactly what to optimize

What it's good at:

• Finding wasted spend
• Identifying optimization opportunities
• Generating specific recommendations
• Continuous monitoring

The process:

1. Connect data sources (5 minutes)
2. AI analyzes (24 hours)
3. Review tickets
4. Execute recommendations
5. See results

AI does the analysis for you.

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Why "Free" Isn't Actually Free

Looker Studio costs $0. But your time isn't free.

Time cost of Looker Studio:

Building dashboards: 2-4 hours (first time)

• Connect data sources
• Choose metrics
• Build charts
• Format layouts
• Test and debug

Maintaining dashboards: 1-2 hours/week

• Dashboards break when data changes
• Metrics need updating
• New campaigns require new charts
• Stakeholders request changes

Analyzing dashboards: 5-10 hours/week

• Review all charts
• Look for patterns
• Try to understand what's happening
• Spot anomalies manually
• Figure out what to do

Total time: 8-16 hours/week

At $100/hour loaded cost: $800-1,600/week = $3,200-6,400/month

Looker Studio "free" cost: $3,200-6,400/month in time

Cogny cost: $500-1,000/month + 1-2 hours/week

Actual cost:

• Looker Studio: $3,200-6,400/month (time)
• Cogny: $500-1,000/month + $200-400/month (time) = $700-1,400/month

Cogny is actually cheaper.

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What Each Tool is Best At

Looker Studio Wins At:

1. Stakeholder Presentations Need to show metrics to CEO/investors? Looker Studio makes beautiful dashboards.

2. Client Reporting (Agencies) Need monthly reports for 20 clients? Looker Studio templates work great.

3. Simple Metric Tracking Just want to see revenue, ROAS, CAC trends? Looker Studio is fine.

4. Zero Budget Literally can't spend any money? Looker Studio is free.

Cogny Wins At:

1. Finding What's Wrong AI spots issues you'd never see manually.

Example: "These 23 keywords have spent €4,200 with zero conversions"

You'd never find all 23 across multiple campaigns manually.

2. Optimization Recommendations AI tells you exactly what to do.

Example: "Reallocate 20% of budget from Campaign A (2.1 ROAS) to Campaign B (6.8 ROAS) → Expected gain: €15K/month"

Looker Studio would show you two numbers. You'd have to figure out the rest.

3. Pattern Detection AI finds patterns across millions of data points.

Example: "Your Meta ads fatigue after 18 days. Performance drops 40% after that. Rotate creative on this schedule."

Looker Studio shows you declining CTR. You guess why.

4. Time Savings AI monitors everything 24/7. You review tickets.

Looker Studio requires constant manual review.

5. Answering "Why?" Ask Cogny: "Why did spend increase 40% yesterday?" AI investigates and answers.

Looker Studio shows you a spike. You dig through campaigns manually.

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Real Comparison: Same Data, Different Tools

Scenario: E-commerce company spending €80K/month on ads

With Looker Studio

Monday morning:

1. Open Looker Studio dashboard
2. See ROAS dropped from 4.2 to 3.8 last week
3. Check campaign breakdown
4. Notice 3 campaigns performing worse
5. Open Google Ads
6. Check each campaign
7. Look at ad sets
8. Check keywords
9. Review search terms
10. Compare to previous weeks
11. Build spreadsheet analysis
12. Form hypothesis
13. Decide on actions
14. Implement changes

Time: 3-4 hours

What you found: "Looks like some keywords aren't performing well"

Confidence level: 60% (might have missed something)

With Cogny

Monday morning:

1. Open Cogny
2. Review 8 new tickets

Ticket #1: "47 keywords spent €3,200 with zero conversions last week → Pause these keywords → Save €3,200/month"

Ticket #2: "Campaign 'Winter Collection' budget increased 2x on Thursday but ROAS held at 4.1 → Keep increased budget or revert?"

Ticket #3: "Meta ad creative 'Lifestyle-Beach' showing fatigue. CTR down 35% from baseline → Rotate to backup creative 'Lifestyle-City'"

Ticket #4: "Audience overlap detected: Ad Sets A, B, C targeting 67% same users → Consolidate → Save €1,800/month"

1. Implement top 4 tickets
2. Done

Time: 30 minutes

What AI found: Specific issues with dollar impact and exact actions

Confidence level: 95% (AI analyzed everything)

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The Dashboard Maintenance Problem

Looker Studio dashboards break constantly.

Why:

1. Data source changes

   • Google Ads adds new columns
   • GA4 changes schema
   • Dashboard metrics break
   • You fix manually

2. Campaign structure changes

   • Launch new campaigns
   • Dashboard doesn't show them
   • You update manually

3. Metric calculation changes

   • Want to track new KPIs
   • Need to add new charts
   • Recalculate formulas

4. Stakeholder requests

   • "Can you add this metric?"
   • "Can you break down by region?"
   • "Can you show last year comparison?"
   • You rebuild dashboard

Time spent maintaining dashboards: 2-4 hours/month

Cogny maintenance: Zero

AI adapts automatically. New campaigns? AI analyzes them. New metrics? Ask AI in natural language. Changes needed? Just ask.

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Can You Use Both?

Yes. Many teams do.

Common pattern:

Looker Studio for:

• Executive dashboards
• Stakeholder reporting
• Board meetings
• Client presentations

Cogny for:

• Day-to-day optimization
• Finding issues
• Getting recommendations
• Actual marketing work

Why this works:

Executives want pretty dashboards. Marketers want actionable insights.

Different audiences. Different needs.

Total cost:

• Looker Studio: Free
• Cogny: $500-1,000/month
• Your time: 5 hours/week (building dashboards) + 2 hours/week (reviewing tickets)

Value:

• Execs happy (pretty dashboards)
• Marketers effective (AI insights)
• Performance improved (optimization)

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Real User Scenarios

Scenario 1: Solo Performance Marketer

Profile:

• Managing €50K/month ad spend alone
• No time to build dashboards
• Need to find optimizations fast

Best choice: Cogny

Why:

Looker Studio means:

• 3 hours building dashboard
• 1-2 hours/week maintaining
• 5-8 hours/week analyzing
• Still might miss opportunities

Cogny means:

• 5 minutes setup
• 1 hour/week reviewing tickets
• AI finds opportunities automatically

Time saved: 7-10 hours/week

For a solo marketer, that's game-changing.

Scenario 2: Agency with 20 Clients

Profile:

• Need client reporting
• Each client wants monthly dashboards
• Also need to optimize performance

Best choice: Both

Use Looker Studio for:

• Client-facing monthly reports
• Template once, reuse 20 times
• Beautiful presentation

Use Cogny for:

• Actual optimization work
• Find issues across all clients
• Generate improvements

Why:

Can't send clients AI tickets. They want polished reports.

Can't manually optimize 20 accounts. Need AI to scale.

Solution: Both tools, different purposes.

Scenario 3: Marketing Team with Data Analyst

Profile:

• 5-person team
• 1 data analyst building dashboards
• Analyst spends all time on reports

Best choice: Cogny (to free up analyst)

Current state:

• Analyst builds Looker Studio dashboards
• Marketers request new views
• Analyst backlog = 3 weeks
• Marketers waiting for insights

With Cogny:

• AI generates insights automatically
• Analyst can focus on strategic analysis
• Marketers get answers instantly
• Everyone more productive

Analyst isn't building basic dashboards. Analyst does high-value work instead.

Scenario 4: Startup with No Budget

Profile:

• Pre-revenue startup
• $5K/month ad spend
• Bootstrapping
• Literally $0 for tools

Best choice: Looker Studio

Why:

At $5K/month spend:

• Not enough data for AI to find patterns yet
• Budget too tight for paid tools
• Looker Studio's free tier is perfect

When to upgrade:

• Ad spend hits $20K+/month
• Team has bandwidth for optimization
• Revenue justifies tool investment

Then switch to Cogny.

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The Question You Should Ask

Not: "Which tool should I use?"

But: "What problem am I solving?"

Problem: "I need to show metrics to stakeholders"

Solution: Looker Studio

Build dashboard. Share link. Done.

Problem: "I need to optimize campaigns and don't know what to fix"

Solution: Cogny

Connect accounts. Get AI tickets. Execute recommendations.

Problem: "I need both"

Solution: Both

Looker Studio for reporting. Cogny for optimization.

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Common Objections

"But Looker Studio is free..."

Your time isn't.

8-16 hours/week building and analyzing dashboards. At $100/hour = $3,200-6,400/month.

Cogny costs $500-1,000/month. Saves you 12+ hours/week.

Net savings: $2,000-5,000/month

Plus: Better optimization outcomes.

"I already built my Looker Studio dashboards..."

Sunk cost fallacy.

Yes, you spent time building them. But you're still spending time:

• Maintaining them
• Analyzing them
• Trying to find insights

That time continues every week.

"My CEO loves our Looker Studio dashboard..."

Great! Keep it.

Use Looker Studio for CEO reporting. Use Cogny for actual optimization.

They solve different problems.

"I like building dashboards..."

Then Looker Studio is perfect for you.

But most marketers don't like building dashboards. They like optimizing campaigns.

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FAQ

Q: Can Cogny export to Looker Studio?

Yes, but you're missing the point.

Cogny's value is AI analysis, not data export.

If you need Looker Studio dashboards, use Looker Studio directly. Use Cogny for optimization.

Q: Does Cogny have dashboards?

Yes, but they're not the focus.

Cogny has:

• Natural language queries ("Show me CAC by channel")
• Custom reports on demand
• Growth ticket dashboard

But Cogny isn't trying to be a dashboard tool. It's trying to be an AI analyst.

Q: Is Looker Studio really free forever?

Yes.

Google provides it free to drive Google Cloud usage. No catch.

Q: Can I try Cogny alongside Looker Studio?

Yes.

Keep your Looker Studio dashboards. Add Cogny for AI analysis.

Compare results for 2-4 weeks. Most teams realize they're spending way less time on analysis with Cogny.

Q: Which has better data visualization?

Looker Studio.

It's a visualization tool. That's what it's built for.

Cogny focuses on insights, not pretty charts.

Q: Which is better for learning marketing analytics?

Depends on learning style:

Looker Studio: Forces you to build dashboards, understand metrics deeply. Good for learning fundamentals.

Cogny: Teaches you what patterns matter, what to optimize. Good for learning what actually drives results.

Both have value.

Q: Can small teams afford Cogny if Looker Studio is free?

If you're spending $20K+/month on ads: Yes.

Cogny typically finds 10-20% efficiency gains. On $20K: $2K-4K/month value. Minus $500-800 cost = $1,200-3,200/month net gain.

Plus time savings.

If you're spending $5K/month: Maybe not yet. Stick with Looker Studio until you scale.

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The Bottom Line

Choose Looker Studio if:

• You need stakeholder reporting
• You want pretty dashboards
• You have zero budget
• You like building dashboards
• You're comfortable with manual analysis
• Ad spend under $20K/month

Choose Cogny if:

• You want to optimize, not report
• You're tired of manual analysis
• You want AI to find opportunities
• You value your time
• Ad spend over $20K/month
• You want specific recommendations

Use both if:

• Need both reporting and optimization
• Want Looker Studio for stakeholders
• Want Cogny for actual marketing work
• Have budget for Cogny (~$500-1,000/month)

Most performance marketers should choose:

Cogny

Why:

Performance marketers don't get paid to build dashboards. They get paid to optimize campaigns.

Looker Studio helps with the first. Cogny does the second.

If forced to choose: Better insights > prettier charts.

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See The Difference

Looker Studio shows you: "ROAS dropped to 3.8"

Cogny tells you: "47 keywords with zero conversions spent €3,200 last week. Pause them. Expected impact: €3,200/month saved + ROAS recovers to 4.4"

One is data. The other is action.

See it yourself:

Schedule a demo and we'll show you what AI finds in your campaigns.

We'll compare:

• What you see in your current dashboards
• What AI discovers in the same data
• Which insights you'd miss manually

Usually finds $5K-20K/month in quick wins.

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About This Comparison

Written by the Cogny team—built by the founders who created AI optimization systems for Netflix, Zalando, and Momondo at Campanja, and scaled growth for Kry, Epidemic Sound, and Yubico through GrowthHackers.se.

We use Looker Studio ourselves for board reporting. But we built Cogny because dashboards don't optimize campaigns. AI does.

Last Updated: December 12, 2024