What Is Big Data Analytics, And How To Apply It To Your Business?
Big Data Analytics uses large volumes of data captured from different sources to aid decision making. In general, it is data: internal of the company, of the market, of the competitors, structured and unstructured.
With digital transformation, Big Data Analytics has become one of the most promising technologies for the business world. This is because its use is associated with a series of benefits, both for improving strategies and processes and increasing sales and revenue.
What Is Big Data Analytics
Before delving into the implementation and the advantages that this technology brings, let’s first clarify a still very common question: There are indeed varying definitions, but we can summarize it as using a large volume of data captured from different sources to aid decision making.
It is, in general, information such as the following types of data:
- company internal
- market
- about competitors
- structured and unstructured
Analyzing diverse information in an integrated way makes it possible to discover patterns and obtain valuable insights for the business, as we will see later. This is essential for companies of all segments. After all, companies need to be data-driven, especially in a context where they are dealing with extremely fierce competition.
Big Data Analytics Benefits For Business
If you are an executive or leader of a business area, you know that some decision making demands the analysis of the various indicators.
For example, if you have a store and want to open another unit, you must consider several aspects before opting for expansion. It will be necessary to evaluate financial indicators, competition, customer profile, and geographic potential. It doesn’t seem trivial.
Thus, strategizing based solely on intuition or “guessing” can incur serious risks. As the world evolves toward digital technologies, looking at data becomes critical.
More Integration, Less Complexity
Let’s go back to the example of retail expansion. Today, it is unthinkable for a shopkeeper not to have at least one management system in place in his unit. With the advancement of technology, the adoption of software and digital solutions tends to expand.
Because they are not integrated, they often generate complexity for the manager who needs to analyze the data generated by all their systems.
A benefit of Big Data Analytics is that business leaders can have an integrated view of different KPIs and indicators. This technology allows them to gather data from other systems to generate insights and analysis.
More Assertive Decisions
Having a global view of the business in real-time makes it possible to outline much more decisive actions for the business. From the automated analysis of sales, competition and market performance data, valuable insights are generated. It is possible, for example, to identify:
- Consumer behavior patterns
- Revenue generation opportunities
- Market share expansion opportunities
- Operation risks and inefficiencies
In the end, Big Data Analytics, when built and used efficiently, helps bring answers to key questions and, more than that, helps in formulating the right questions.
Another advantage is gaining insights that guide quick reactions in the short term. This means, for example, having the agility to identify a drop in sales of a certain product and, from there, make decisions to reverse this scenario.
How Has It Been Used In Companies?
Big Data Analytics can respond to challenges in different business areas. In market intelligence, it contributes to the generation of insights with more productivity.
In practice, technology has helped this area to effectively impact the indicators of companies, with actions that promote improved results in marketing and sales. Let us consider the case of an industry with units spread across different regions.
By monitoring company, competitor and market data through analytics, intelligence can, for example, identify how the production capacity of these units is doing, their performance of local competitors, and thereby support decisions such as expansion or deactivation of operations.
In the commercial area, it generates competitive intelligence and enables monitoring KPIs in real-time for better pricing before the competition, to cite an example.
Even departments that were traditionally seen as less strategic can now positively impact companies’ results with the adoption of analytics. A clear example of this is the evolution of corporate communication. From the use of Big Data, the area has raised its level of relevance in companies, generating and proving its ROI much more efficiently, in numbers that make sense for other departments and the executive level.
Impact Of Big Data Analytics On Professional Life
The fact is that, due to these transformations that the world has been going through, the use of Big Data Analytics tends to expand in organizations of all sizes. In less time than we think, it will stop being a competitive advantage and become something as massive as the daily spreadsheets.
For professionals, the challenge remains to update themselves as soon as possible for this scenario. In the same way, technology has been gaining more relevance; the same happens with those who have mastered its use.
Also Read: What Is Big Data? Why Is It Important Today?
