Hill Investment Group’s penchant for boiling down complex issues into simple visual ideas is one of the many things I believe sets us apart. It’s a piece of what made Hill immediately comfortable to me, as over the past decade I’ve been applying these concepts to the communication of personal financial data.

Academic studies show that people only remember a tiny percentage of what they hear and only slightly more of what they read. But we retain a majority of what we see and actively experience—and the use of color can even further increase understanding.

Having clarity in financial infrastructure—particularly in complex situations—is critical to contextual financial decision-making. Visualization techniques have proven a highly effective manner for providing that clearly.

I look forward to further exploring how visualization impacts financial understanding and, ultimately, success.

We’ve started to use social media platforms here and there, and we want to make sure you catch some of our shorter bits throughout the month. To that end, we’ll do a monthly roundup of posts that you might have missed here in the newsletter. Here’s the sampling from March and April.

With the buzz of the 2014 Major League Baseball Season in the air, this is a great time to revisit one of our favorite books, Moneyball, by Michael Lewis. For the unfamiliar, this book is to baseball as Taking the long view is to investing: a look at how data and evidence will allow you to make smarter decisions in evaluating baseball players—and investment choices.

Our colleague, friend, and director of investment strategy for the BAM ALLIANCE, Jared Kizer, wrote a great blog post where he talks about some of the similar applications in investing that predate Moneyball.

When you use the data and evidence, it allows you to ignore the noise and focus on factors that really matter. That’s how we approach investing for our clients.

If you haven’t read Moneyball or seen the movie, let us know and we would be happy to send you either version of this now classic Michael Lewis story.