Data plays a major role in the day-to-day life of any business. Facts and analytics help business leaders make informed decisions. In the digital world we live in today, there is an abundance of data circulating the internet, and it is our responsibility to extract the valuable, true, and important data. A study conducted by IBM examined data and analytics being a critical factor in conducting business. Based on the report, here are ways data can help your business:
Benefits of Data
Competitive advantage: Using machine learning and artificial intelligence can help obtain crucial information and apply it across your enterprise to differentiate yourself from your competitor. According to the IBM study, 58% of firms agree “data and analytics are very important to the business competitiveness of their organization.” Business leaders recognize evidence-based responses lead towards better decisions Technology tools can help add value to your organization that consumers will notice.
Problem solving: Have you ever wondered why your sales are dropping? Or why your marketing strategies have been performing poorly lately? It can be difficult to distinguish what is causing these inconveniences, but gathering information can help discover the pain points in your workflow. By collecting and properly storing data you can rely on analyzing it when you face challenges.
For example, if website traffic is down, you can rely on analyzing user habits and which categories have low traffic. There may be errors and pages not working that need to be fixed. Collecting statistics ultimately can help you understand the performance of your business and help improve it.
Decision making: A lot of organizations base their decisions on projections and valuable information they collect. By expanding the specifics you collect, it allows for more informed decisions to be made. In fact, “over half of organizations are expanding a broad range of data and analytics initiatives such as setting up or expanding data science centers of excellence and improving existing products or services using data and analytics.” These implementations not only help make decisions, but they can also help grow and improve efficiencies.
Customer relations: Without analytics, it is impossible to understand who your customers are and what your demographic is. So how do you know how to market your product and more importantly your brand? Data gives you the ability to understand your consumers’ wants and needs on a better level. By tracking their purchasing habits, you will know what types of products they do and don’t like, and promote specific products to each individual. Not only will this help improve sales, but it will also help build a better relationship with your customer.
Challenges & Risks of Data
Although there are many benefits of using information as a powerful tool, there are also risks that users should be aware of. Collecting data is one thing, but assuring it safe to only qualified users is another. Technology companies, such as Sangwa Solutions, can provide hosting services that secure your data and implement proper barriers to ensure only verified users can access it.
It can also be a challenge to analyze the information you collect. What do you do with the copious numbers and analytics? Sometimes it is valuable to hire a data expert to examine and extract important information. According to IBM “48% of organizations are hiring additional data scientists, creating/expanding data science centers of excellence, and encouraging collaboration among analytics and data science teams.”
Modern business relies on data and analytics. It is essential to properly collect and store your figures to properly utilize it. To do so, you must invest in the proper tools that will keep your business secure, and easily accessible to you. To grow your business, talk to a data analytics or tech expert today.