5 Ways Using Business Data Can Transform Companies

Business Data October 01, 2020

Chloe Henderson

Writer

Organizations with little to no record-keeping systems remain unaware of inefficient operations and emerging trends, putting them at risk of falling behind the competition.

Companies with existing automated processes can monitor historical and real-time business data to stay informed on fluctuating customer preferences. This enables businesses to make changes and launch projects that are supported by impactful information.

Therefore, companies should discover how to collect business data and how this can enhance their performance.

What is Business Data?

Every company that keeps records of internal processes, sales, and market trends has access to business data. Business data refers to all of the information an organization stores, from customer information to key performance indicators (KPIs). This data is used to help management make informed decisions rather than relying on personal estimates.

While companies that utilize manual processes do have business data, they are unable to access what is known as big data. In simple terms, big data is just a collection of several sets of internal and external business data.

This can even include retrieving customer reviews from social media or discovering competitor's strategies from market trends. Companies that utilize manual record-keeping are unable to have big data because they do not have the means to collect and analyze a significant amount of information without being overwhelmed.

However, automated processes, such as inventory and ordering software, have the capacity to collect, store, and evaluate information simultaneously with machine learning processes. Business data analytics is optimized with forecasting systems that use big data to handle data mining and detect emerging trends. This enables companies to not only make data-driven decisions that affect current operations, but anticipate and prepare for future events as well.

5 Benefits of Business Data

No matter what industry a company is in, collecting business data can help improve their performance, competitive edge, and profitability. Organizations, small to large, can utilize analytics to-

1. Make Better Decisions

A Deloitte study found that 49% of business respondents found analytics and business data helped them make better decisions. Every type of business, from startups to online stores, generate data from marketing metrics, transactions, and customer interactions. It is up to the company to utilize this information and unlock its potential to improve business.

By analyzing incoming data, management can make educated decisions on how to-

Expand Customer Reach

Increase Customer Loyalty

Improve Customer Service

Enhance Marketing Campaigns

Monitor Customer Interactions

Predict Market Trends

Improve Customer Satisfaction and Advocacy

Ultimately the potential of business data is limitless, it just depends on how an organization uses it. Companies can manipulate and evaluate different data sets to gain insights into various facets of their operations.

2. Solve Issues

Without business data analytics, companies are left questioning what went wrong to cause poor performance results. This leaves management investing time and money into manually investigating issues or relying on guesswork to implement changes. On the other hand, business data enables managers to pinpoint exactly where a plan went wrong by monitoring and recording all internal activities.

For example, if a marketing promotion did not yield ideal customer engagement or sales, management can check reports to determine whether the campaign should have been launched in another sales channel. This enables companies to quickly identify problems, pinpoint where they stemmed from, and make improvements.

By continuing to collect metrics, management can determine if the changes corrected the issue or if they need to create a new plan of action.

3. Understand Performance

Just as football teams watch films to see their performance, as well as the competition's, enterprises use business data to analyze how well they execute tasks. The information provides a reference in which organizations can view their performance and define strengths and weaknesses to make alterations. This data is continuously updated with incoming metrics, from transactions and reviews, enabling companies to efficiently monitor their progression.

Business data has the ability to scale up or down depending on an organization's needs. Aside from gaining insight into a business's overall performance, management can gauge the productivity of individual departments. For the sales department, managers can view performance reports to determine their leading and subordinate sales representatives, individual customer interactions, and generated revenue.

The same process can be done for each department to find which operations are lagging a company's overall performance.

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4. Improve Internal Processes

Collecting data from each operation helps management understand which processes are a drain on company time and money. Just one inefficient system can impact sequential processes, wasting resources and labor. This can ultimately reduce a business's overall operational efficiency and bottom line. With detailed reports and analysis, companies can locate discrepancies and discover what steps need to be reworked to improve a process.

For example, marketing campaigns are expensive and require extensive brainpower to launch. Therefore, a failed promotion can cost a business significant time, funds, and resources, putting them in jeopardy of losing customers and reducing profits.

However, with information on sales channels, customer demand, and product lines, marketing teams can create impactful campaigns with a guaranteed high return of investment (ROI). Marketers can also gain insight into underperforming platforms to discover how to attract consumers and increase sales.

5. Understand Consumers

Companies must collect and monitor data analysis in order to build buyer personas, create a loyal clientele, and create a personalized customer experience. Otherwise, businesses are unaware of consumer preferences, such as popular products, sales channels, and shopping experience.

Business data defines these elements so retailers can work to improve average order value (AOV) and profits. Software like point-of-sale (POS) systems collect information from each transaction to generate reports on all buyer activity. This enables businesses to optimize marketing schemes, customer interactions, and satisfaction levels.

Business data is a powerful tool that enables organizations to better their business model and expansion efforts with data science. Through continual data consolidation, companies can enhance their business intelligence and overcome obstacles.