What is Business Intelligence?
Business Intelligence is a process used by companies to gather information from respective business fields to transform it later into knowledge that can be used to understand customer needs. Business Intelligence is particularly important for businesses that require lots of customer data to serve them better.
For instance, the tourism industry can greatly benefit when they have substantial information about the target group of customers, their economic level, their social status, their educational background, their cultural trends, and their the psychological motivation.
Businesses from all over the world have successfully managed to use business intelligence to realize their short-term and long-term goals and it is important that every business likewise uses business intelligence.
Tracing the Roots of Business Intelligence
Business experts trace the history of business intelligence to Sun Tzu’s “The Art of War” which depicts the central idea of business intelligence. Sun Tzu believed a war could be won only if you were aware of the strengths and weaknesses of your enemies as well as the strengths and weaknesses of yourself.
Similarly, companies can succeed only if they know their competitors well and understand their own potential. Effective business and marketing strategies can be planned only if you have a good deal of information about your industry, your competitors, and, more importantly, your potential customers.
Therefore, you must critically examine every aspect of your business in order to carve a niche in the highly competitive business world.
Using Key Performance Indicators, or KPI
Companies widely use Key Performance Indicators (KPI) in business intelligence to evaluate various aspects of a business. The biggest advantage of using KPI is that information is readily available to end-users within very little time. In the absence of KPIs, companies might take several months in order to gather the required information related to the overall performance of the company, causing further delay in adapting business strategies to fit changing market needs.
Recognizing the need to obtain data quickly, some banks are devising strategies to provide data within a very short period to businesses having higher credit or operational risk.
Business Intelligence Tools
Due to the extent of the information involved, companies rely on business intelligence tools such as data warehouses, data mining, and data modeling to collect, manage, store, and organize business information. Companies greatly rely on these data tools as they help in improving the overall efficiency of the business.
Currently, there are several vendors who provide business intelligence tools as well as support to help businesses successfully execute their business processes. With the number of companies depending on business intelligence growing by the day, there is a huge demand for these kinds of services.
Business experts believe that if implemented correctly, business intelligence can do wonders for any business. Business intelligence is something every business must incorporate into their business strategies in order to understand the demands of their customers and serve them better.
