Month: April 2015

3 Ways You’re Misusing Business Intelligence

Although its intent is to simplify your data collection strategies, business intelligence bad habits prevent businesses from fully flourishing.How confident are you in your ability to utilize your data collection technology properly and effectively? How many times do you second-guess the data you’re receiving? How often are you asking your IT team to double-check if the business intelligence program that you’re using is accurately displaying the right statistics?

In short, you shouldn’t doubt your BI solution — after all, it is called a solution. And it’s not uncommon for business owners or the decision-makers beneath the executive level to have trouble making sense of all the charts and graphs that are intended to make your life simpler, but perhaps may even complicate things further.

To improve the use of your data collection strategy, we’ve outlined some of the most common habits that hinder your data analysis efforts and ultimately your overall productivity.

Oversimplified Data

This habit changes frequently given the constantly evolving innovations of the industry. Think of it like the story of Goldilocks and the Three Bears – you want to find the perfect medium that’s not too simple, but also not too complex to comprehend where the data is practically rendered useless.

With technological advancements comes the ability to make the complex digestible and easier to understand. Your BI solution should be able to tackle your more complicated requests. As a decision maker, you are likely aware of when you should take a step back with your add-ons and when you should push forward with new technology to get the desired data you need to make more sound business choices.

The Cloud Isn’t Necessarily Your Solution

Cloud technology is one of the industry's latest innovations, but is likely not the cure-all for data collection issues.Although the industry’s latest technology may appear extremely appealing and like the answer to all of your internal data collection issues, it’s likely not the solution you’re looking for. Unless you’re satisfied with your business intelligence tool at the moment, except for the fact that you can’t access it 24/7/365, switching over to cloud technology will likely not revolutionize the way you collect your data.

The key point to focus on should be its effectiveness and usefulness. Before making a major change, ask yourself: does it deliver the results that you want it to? If the issue is convenience rather than efficacy, then perhaps moving your data to the cloud is the right move. Otherwise, try to gain a better understanding of your strategies, how your system works, the data you want displayed and the best way to achieve these goals.

Using Impractical Business Value

Once you input all of your necessary statistics – sales, inventory, exports, etc. — that may not be all you need to do to achieve your business goals. Sometimes the business intelligence tools that you use do a good job of collecting or displaying your data, but don’t necessarily perform well when it comes to providing you practical, business information.

We value our devices for their ability to give us objective data and the same goes for data collection tools. However, there are some important business intricacies that data generated from a computer can’t display. As a caution, don’t assume that extracting information from your BI solution is the only way way you can interpret your data. Instead, take some time to analyze the statistics and see if there are some risks, limitations or transactions that aren’t accounted for — and be sure to include them before you make any major decision.

In summary, don’t be afraid to use trial-and-error in your search of finding the optimum business intelligence solution. In fact, should you need assistance in finding or adding to  a data collection tool that fulfills your needs, contact one of our representatives today for all your BI needs!

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3 Big Data Trends Changing the Game

Having more NEW ways to visualize your business data helps executives understand what changes need to be made moving forward. In the industry of big data, there are many moving parts that are working together to provide businesses with an easier method to track their company operations. As we get deeper into the culture of interconnectivity, the value of having readable, statistical data rises to the top of an executive’s needs.

And these brand new ideas are popping up every day. To help you keep track of the latest updates in the data collection industry, we’ve outlined the latest big data trends that seem to be gaining the most traction as of late.

Analytics Are on the Rise

What’s a successful business without proper planning, anyway? By being able to read your data with a convenient big data tool, you’re improving your chances to make the right business choices that grow your earnings. Often times, it’s not the data itself that makes the difference in how you approach tough decisions, but rather how it’s presented.

With the help of today’s technology, ERP systems and business intelligence tools alike are presenting your company data in ways that are easy to visualize and digest. By using these tools more often, businesses can expect easier, more efficient forecasting with the ability to properly analyze the recent months of transactions.

Cloud Capability

As you may already be aware, data storage in the cloud is becoming increasingly popular due to how easy it is to use. By being able to connect to your information from any device with internet access to reducing your need to have a physical storage room for your many clients, cloud technology has really taken off as an inevitable trend for the future.

In fact, for the next three years, public cloud usage is predicted to grow 44% whereas the usage of on-premise computing workloads is expected to only grow 8.9%.

Plus, the number of data analytic tools in the cloud are on the rise. With major names like Amazon entering the market, it’s only a matter of time before more big names offer widely-accessible tools to store your information.

So with the future of this wireless technology looking promising and its perks being inevitable for small and medium-sized businesses, it can be expected that this type of data storage is here to stay for the longterm.

IoT (Internet of Things)

The progression of business and personal technology has brought us, as a society, to the IoT — the Internet of Things. This concept is practically the symbiotic relationship between all devices from your computers to the tools your IT team uses to your POS system.

The relationship they all have with one another is something that we can expect to be enhanced in the near future. It’s being done already. For instance, If you have a computer that can wirelessly send a message to your printer, then this, on a small scale, is what we can expect among more devices.

The Internet of Things (IoT) is a quickly growing trend that's sychronizes many technologies to simplify business operations.What’s the benefit? The rise of IoT can lead to less human interaction with the devices we use in the workplace. From ordering and restocking your storage room when inventory gets low to changing business practices once sales slow down, the Internet of Things allows the technology around you to run on auto-pilot while you can focus on running your business and managing more difficult tasks.

While new trends come to light and become popular in the business world, running your company will eventually become easier and require less work done physically in the office.

As one of the premier business intelligence providers, our team takes pride in helping executives achieve their data collection, analysis and visualization goals — no matter their current technology. For more on how we can improve your big data goals, contact one of our representatives today!

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What Is ERP?

If you’re now considering acquiring an ERP solution to implement into your current business structure, you’re in for a treat. It’s likely that you find your accounting, inventory control or product planning figures to be in disarray and you need a simple solution to have it all in one convenient place. With today’s landscape of business intelligence options, there’s many innovative software on the market to help you simplify the way you collect your big data.

At Business Impact, we understand the importance of having the proper data collection strategy and how crucial it is to your company’s operations. With that said, we’d like to break down the basics of the software that is enterprise resource planning — or more commonly known as ERP.

Enterprise Resource Planning is a helpful data collection tool that makes it easier for your business to make sound business decisions.

What Is ERP?

ERP is essentially the gathering of back-office information using a business process management software. Data collection for ERP is brought to the user via modules that focus on several business figures. They likely cater to important company features like product purchasing, product planning, distribution, accounting, marketing, human resources, finance and inventory. More specifically, an EPM (enterprise performance management) would focus on tracking your budget’s purpose and execution.

Why Is ERP Essential?

How many times have you had to crunch end-of-the-quarter numbers and have had a tough time sorting out your numbers on an Excel spreadsheet? Perhaps you have all the information you need to make forward-thinking business decisions, but all of the data is hard to assemble in one format. Here lies the beauty of having an ERP software.

In addition to saving you crucial company time from going back and forth between documents, web browser tabs or computer programs, an ERP solution gives you the ability to analyze your data with all of it right in front of you. As you designate which ERP modules you’d like to focus on, you’ll now have the ability to improve your company’s data flow with streamlined business intelligence.

Furthermore, most ERP software systems utilize the best practices feature which shows the user potential plans of actions using the information it has collected. Implementing the right ERP solution serves to benefit everyone involved: decision makers, employees in the field, consumers and business partners.

Gain complete integration across
From front-end to back-end processes to forecasts to production, you should have real-time statistics that cater to each quantitative area of business.

Enhance productivity with automation
Eliminate the need to balance your data with a software that organizes and displays the figures for you.

Increase company performance
Optimize your decision-making and keep your staff up-to-date with the latest information to ensure well-informed company operations.

Create quality reports & performance analysis
Rather than taking company time out to map out the latest quarter’s earnings, simply use your ERP software to extract the data. Plus, the use of your graphs and charts will make it easier for you to review a team or individual’s performance.

Simplifying your big data into readable charts and graphs will save your team ample amounts of time spent on analyzing statistics.

What Business Impact Can Do with Your ERP

Here at Business Impact, our team can revolutionize your data collection strategy no matter what software your company currently uses. As specialists in the Ross ERP system (now Aptean), we’re able to build additional BI solutions to be used within the software application.

After all, we understand the importance of being able to analyze your data without having to ask your IT staff for assistance. As our focus is on helping companies achieve simple, accurate and up-to-date information, we stop at nothing to ensure your ERP and BI solution provides the data you need to make solid business decisions.

As you prepare to choose which ERP solution you’d like to use, there are a few kind that are available on the market today. From large enterprise to mid-market to small business to mobile-friendly to cloud-based to two-tier ERPs, there are options out there to suit your exact need. Contact one of our representatives TODAY to discuss which one is right for your business.

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3 Factors to Consider in Your Mobile BI Solution

digital tablet and smartphone with financial chart report, paperYour business intelligence solution’s main responsibility is to provide you with convenient, efficient and accessible data that allows you to make confident business choices as a result. Does yours fill those needs?

As the 21st century’s technology continues to improve the way businesses are run and the way mobile devices are valued, it’s only right that these two enhancements have found a way to integrate and impact your decision making.