Business Value of Analytics: A Research Report
Business Analytics (BA) refers to the tools and techniques that make it possible to glean value from big data. These tools are used to turn data into actionable information for management, organization and decision making.
Majority of organizations can benefit from BA, but here are some of the indicators that you should look into a BA strategy for an organization:
• The need to integrate data from multiple business applications or data sources
• Lack of visibility into the company's operations, finances, and other areas
• The need to access relevant business data quickly and efficiently
• Increasing volume of users requiring and accessing information and more end-users requiring analytical capabilities
• Rapid company growth or a recent or pending merger/acquisition
• Introduction of new products / services
• Upgrades within the IT environment.
Though, different kind and size of organizations are using BA, some of the most popular applications of BA include:
Finance: Companies these days have a large amount of financial data. Use of intelligent BA tools can help use this data to determine the products' prices.
Also, based on historical information BAs can study the trends on the performance of a particular stock and advise the
client on whether to retain it or sell it.
Marketing: Use BA to gauge the effectiveness and impact of a marketing strategy on the customers. Data can be used to build loyal customers by giving them exactly what they want as per their specifications.
HR Professionals: HR manager can predict the employee retention rate based on data given by BA.
CRM: The company wants to improve its service in a geographical segment. With data analytics, one can predict the customer's preferences in that segment, what appeals to them, and accordingly improve relations with customers.
Manufacturing: The Manager wantsinformation on performance of a machinery which has been used past 10 years. The historical data will help evaluate the performance of the machinery and decide whether costs of maintaining the machine will exceed the cost of buying a new machinery.
Credit Card Companies: Credit card companies can help the retail sector by locating the target audience. According to the transactions reports, retail companies can predict the choices of the consumers, their spending pattern, preference over buying competitor's products, etc.
This historical as well asreal-time information helpsthem direct their marketing strategies in such a way that it hits the dart and reaches the right audience.
YOUR TASK:
Your task for this assignment is to select an industry that has implemented BA successfully. Please note that applications of BA listed above are just few examples and is not an exhaustive list of applications by any means.
After selecting an application of BA in an industry of your choice, you need to write a report that should address the following aspects of BA implementation:
1. Overview of the selected industry
2. Drivers to adopt BA
3. Perceived benefits to achieve from BA
4. BA strategy employed by the industry
5. Challenges to BA strategy
6. Actual benefits achieved through the implementation of BA
7. Drawback of the selected BA strategy
8. Your recommendations to make more effective BA strategy
You are required to conduct a comprehensive review of literature (at least 10 references) to support your arguments.