Business Intelligence: Why Do I Need It?
How can businesses analyse data to make discoveries that lead to a competitive edge?
The answer? Business intelligence.
It’s likely your company has an abundance of data, yet most companies are only analysing about 10% of it. However, for organisations to be data-driven, they should make a point of utilising their ever-expanding stores of data. Business intelligence can help your business better understand its customers by helping you better understand your data. Of course, by using and analysing data, companies can predict and get ahead of trends and drive innovation and growth. However, employees aren’t always comfortable working with data or new software to interpret it. Nevertheless, the latest generation of business intelligence software is changing that.
What is Business Intelligence?
Business intelligence (BI) describes the gathering of raw data which is then analysed and turned into actionable insights for a business.
Equally important, the newest generation of BI tools leverage AI, machine learning, and embedded analytics. This, hence, makes it easier for non-technical users to create business value with data. AI-fueled business data analysis enables companies to reinvent the customer experience, detect new revenue streams, and drive digital transformation.
What does business intelligence software do?
It helps companies collect, combine, analyse, visualise, and explicate data from different business systems and other data sources, either internally or externally. BI software allows business users to easily salvage and extract valuable insights from this data, allowing users to make better, more informed business decisions.
How is business intelligence software used?
BI software is implemented by a variety of industries for a variety of business use cases.
Companies primarily use business intelligence for:
- Revenue and sales forecasting
- Demand forecasting
- Strategic planning
- Market research
- Trend detection
- Performance management
- Customer behaviour analysis
- Marketing campaign analysis
- Financial reporting
- Budget planning
- Operations optimisation
Who uses business intelligence software?
Business intelligence is used by a plethora of industries and throughout the organisations themselves. In fact, executives, financial managers, product managers, inventory managers, HR, data analysts, marketing, and R&D – all use BI software to support their problem solving and decision-making skills.
Here are a few examples of how organisations employ BI:
C-suite executives: BI software updates executives, provides them with at-a-glance views of operational and financial performance, helps them spot trends, develops data-driven strategies, and enables the pursuit of new directions based on the findings.
Business managers: With BI software, business managers can obtain both overall views of the business and granular information about specific operations in areas of the business. Similarly, they can quickly gather insights and share them with stakeholders. Again, business intelligence enables managers to quickly access information which is needed to make smarter decisions faster.
Business analysts: BI systems allow analysts to find meaningful correlations, patterns, and trends in their data by visualising, exploring, and manipulating it. This likewise accelerates the process of business analysis and the distribution of insights across decision-makers.
What are the benefits of AI-enabled business intelligence software?
BI tools fundamentally change how users interact with analytics. To illustrate, tools like Qlik Sense leverage AI and machine learning techniques to automate data preparation and insight discovery. Additionally, business intelligence software knows and understands your data and can suggest insights to users, enabling them to better navigate their data with the creation of precise dashboards and data visualisations. Not only can you have a conversation with your data, through natural language interfaces, but you can also interact with your analytics via voice commands, questions, etc.
In addition, business intelligence can:
- Identify important trends and critical issues
- Inform decision-making, guide strategy development
- Drive transformation
What is Qlik Sense?
Qlik Sense, the robust data analytics platform, is the leading business intelligence software that enhances human intuition with AI-fueled automation and insights. Also, Qlik Sense delivers scale and flexibility to your company. Indeed, it allows everyone in your organisation to contend with complex analytical challenges. In fact, users of all skill levels can explore data without limits, combine and load data, create smart visualisations and compelling reports, and create interactive drag and drop dashboards. The platform enables your business to transform into a truly data-driven enterprise, empowering your organisation to make well-informed decisions every single day.
