The human brain processes pictures far easier than large quantities of numerical data, therefore, raw and unprocessed data doesn’t offer real value to businesses. When your data is visualised with the right analytics, powerful insights can be unlocked, allowing business leaders to make reliable data-driven decisions.
Organisations often don’t know where to begin when it comes to analytics, with most remaining at the bottom of the curve. Realising what kinds of tools break data down to cultivate business growth and what the different types of analytics all mean, can be a complicated process.
The value of business intelligence
Business intelligence (BI) is not a one size fits all process. There are three different types of analytics, each offering a different insight to help companies make the most of the data they have. The value the data brings to the business increases as you provide more complex analytics.
Understanding data analytics
Descriptive analytics – ‘What happened?’
A retrospective view, descriptive analytics gives an insight into historical data to help organisations understand past behaviours and performance. This is the most basic form of analytics and pulls data into condensed and manageable information, think social media analytics.
Predictive analytics – ‘What’s probable?’
Predictive analytics is the next step in refining data. It helps organisations to understand what will happen in the future. By using data mining and machine learning algorithms to analyse past data patterns and trends, predictive analytics can help with goal setting and financial planning.
Prescriptive analytics – ‘Best course of action?’
This refers to the simulation and optimisation of data that goes beyond predictive analytics. Prescriptive analytics not only attempts to predict the future, but predict multiple outcomes based on implications of different decisions. This results in insights and recommendations on the best course of action.
Although many companies are at the descriptive stage, there’s no doubt that predictive and prescriptive analytics gives the best insight for informed decision making. However, as the volume of your data increases so does the complexity. This is where you could benefit from the expertise of a Data Analyst.
How can a data analyst help?
A data analyst can help you unlock the potential of your data, saving you a lot of time and headache. Working with a partner who has the expertise in data consultancy and understanding data and analytics can help you:
- Get data into the right format for analysis
- Consolidate data sources into a central depository or data warehouse
- Integrate different systems to enable the smooth transfer of data
- Advise on data cleansing and database optimisation
- Automate manual data processing and re-keying
If you want to get the most value from you data, talk to us today.
