Data is one of a company’s most valuable, but underused business assets. Regardless of quantity, data holds the truth to performance and can reveal it at micro-granular levels. When connected, data can answer key business questions that no gut feeling could. Only with data can you understand where your customers come from, what they’re interested in and why they sometimes disengage.
Companies often have more data than they know, but it’s spread across different platforms and channels — siloed ecosystems that only a few have access to. To make the information meaningful, you need to bring it all together; without context, it’s meaningless.
It’s easy to talk about how powerful data can be, but it’s another thing to make it work within your organization. Companies are investing in understanding how to leverage data for more personalized experiences and better customer intelligence. However, there are some roadblocks that can stand in the way to truly harnessing the power of data.
- Integration of Disparate Tools: Different departments within an organization use different platforms to complete daily tasks. These platforms collect different sets of data that could be useful in other departments. Most platforms are not integrated to share data because it wasn’t an initial requirement of the system when it was implemented. Without connected platforms, you’ll still have a view of your customers, but it will have multiple blind spots, which could mean missed opportunities.
- Analytics Adoption: It’s one thing to produce reports with insights, but it’s quite another to have your teams take action on those insights. Typically, this issue arises when the insight isn’t actionable, the dashboards are too complex or reports are presented just because. The report’s audience is responsible for letting the analysts know if a report is too simple or too complex for them to take action on. The better aligned the insights are to the needs of that department, the easier that important data can be adopted.
Here are five tips to overcome these roadblocks and improve analytical insights, allowing your organization to become more data-driven: