By Sanjay Khatnani, Managing Partner, J2 Solutions
Where are you in your data journey? Do you have a data strategy in place? If not, what’s stopping you? 
Today’s business environment is largely data-driven as data volume continues to grow at unprecedented rates. And while every business has data—loads and loads of data—many aren’t harnessing it to extract actionable insights. A costly mistake.
There are a number of reasons for this. Maybe they don’t know exactly where it’s housed. Maybe it’s in multiple disparate repositories and it’s just too overwhelming to tackle. Maybe they just don’t know where to start. Whatever the reason, if a business isn’t tapping into their data to pull insights, they are missing out on a valuable opportunity to improve operations, drive efficiencies, cut costs and identify new streams of revenue.
The fact is, your data is more than a byproduct of business activity; it’s a treasure trove of insight that’s waiting to be mined. If used intelligently, this important business asset can help you spot trends, uncover correlations and answer key business questions. For example, your data can tell you where your customers are coming from, their demographic makeup and their behavioral patterns and/or preferences. It can also help you analyze market and geographic penetration, product holdings, which products are commonly associated with each other and campaign performance. You can even use it to uncover operational inefficiencies and delve into your distribution of spend, value and profit.
With this information, you can make more profitable decisions that have the power to reshape and grow your business. Specifically, you’ll be able to:
- Find new customers
- Increase customer retention
- Predict sales trends
- Revamp and refine operations
- Create new services or products
- And more…
According to a BACR research study that surveyed 559 business and IT decision-makers across the globe, 69 percent of businesses said Big Data helps them make better strategic decisions. Fifty four percent reported improved operating processes and 52 percent have a better understanding of their customers. The icing on the cake: those businesses reported an average 8 percent increase in revenue and a 10 percent reduction in costs.1
While capturing, sharing and managing your data may seem daunting on the surface, there are many tools and resources out there that can help you simplify complex processes that ultimately results in profitable decisions. With the right solutions and processes in place, you can aggregate data from hundreds of sources in real-time, pull insights and deliver transformative value to your business. Well worth the investment.
Do you have a data strategy in place? If not, what are you waiting for?