The Way Data is Changing Small (and Large) Businesses
Data is the big transformative element of society today. We are living in post-industrial world – and it means that it is the data, not material goods, that lies at the basis of, well, everything. But just because we have a lot of data it doesn’t mean we know what to do with it.
Which means that those who know what to do with it are always going to be a step ahead of those who don’t.
As a business owner, the better you are at correctly interpreting data, the easier it is for you to adapt your business to the ever-changing modern world. Here are ways you can do it.
1. ERP
Enterprise Resource Planning is a function that can be performed by specialists, software, or some combination of the two. The last is usually the arrangement that is struck. There are a billion different data points, many pools of records and observations associated with your particular industry.
By looking closely at your business’s place in this industry, ERP can chart a course for you over the next month, year, decade. ERP allows businesses to be more agile than even the most experienced leaders could manage on their own. No one has the level of perception that real data provides, and ERP is a way of channeling it into incisive, actionable advice.
2. Data Analysis for Retailers
Data is currently at the crux of change in online retail. Because all of the steps of the customer process are recorded in web retailing, these data points have amassed into a huge wealth of knowledge. Retailing giants like Amazon use this data to determine what products you are likely to buy, even if you haven’t searched for them yet.
Their skill at doing this, and at pricing items so that you are most likely to buy them, has enabled them to build the biggest web retailing empire in history. In order to access their data mine, smaller retailers have given them a share of their profits, just to be able to set up shop under their digital roof.
This changes when data providers offer the same level of data access and analysis to retailers outside of the Amazon bubble. Some new companies, like Wiser, have emerged to do just this, and are providing retailers with information that will let them offer a customer the right product at the right time at the right price.
This may not lead to a total democratization of online retail, but it will enable more dynamic pricing wherever goods are sold, and this can only increase diversity in the sphere – something that is likely to be good for retailers and consumers alike.
3. Exploring Trends with Google
Google is probably one of the biggest players in information playfield; by being by far the most widely used and popular search engine it manages to collect, analyze and store a veritable goldmine of information. And, what is more important, it offers completely free access to it, which may provide you with priceless business insights.
Enter Google Trends – a free tool allowing you to study search trends, see what is popular, which keywords are used with other words and how often, where this or that search is more popular and so on. For a businessman with imagination it opens up a highway to innumerable opportunities.
4. Studying numerical data about your website
If your website plays an important role in the life of your business (and if you live in 2015, chances are that it does), you probably often wonder who are all these people that visit it, according to traffic charts.
Fortunately, today there is a million ways to get quite accurate data concerning it. Take, for example, Quantcast – it is a tool that allows you to simply type in the name of a website and get a report (free of charge!) with detailed information on its visitors: how many they are, what is their demographic make-up, where they live, how many of them use mobile devices and so on. Priceless information at no cost – what can be better?
5. Tap into Credit Card Transactions
Sounds illegal? Well, there are ways to do it in full accordance with the law, but also without paying through the nose.
Credit card transactions contain a fascinating amount of data that any businessman would be happy to get, but until recently access to it has been limited to large companies ready to go into a great deal of expense.
Luckily for you, today there are companies like Tranzlogic that make it possible even for a small business to tap into this source of information and reap all its benefits.
Data is going to change our lives in unpredictable ways. With the election and things like the Moneyball book, data is part of our cultural conversation. It is giving us context that is changing the way we see the world, and our own place in it. The way it will change business is unknown, but these changes will certainly develop along the above-mentioned channels.
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