In today’s world, data is limitless. But, this Big Data, will help you achieve your targets, if we use it efficiently. Otherwise, you’ll be trapped in a web of data. For this, you need to do a gap analysis i.e. what data you have today and what data would you like to have.

To answer these questions, this article by Mary C. Long, Chief Ghost at Digital Media Ghost, suggests three tracks on which your business can move forward on:

1. Get a handle on your current data
2. Vet potential data sources and set a realistic budget
3. Add ONE new data source to your client insight capabilities

To know more, visit the following link on cmswire.com:

http://www.cmswire.com/cms/customer-experience/dont-let-big-data-keep-you-up-at-night-028895.php

Big data represents a major change in the way businesses and other organizations operate and will require a new mind-set and capabilities. Extracting business value from big data seems to be a complicated task. But, it can be easily accomplished, if done in a planned manner. Following article reports nine steps, given by HCL Technologies CEO, Anant Gupta, in the World Economic Forum’s Information Technology Report, to help organizations overcome the barriers in transition to Big Data and minimize the difficulties that may occur along the way:

http://www.information-age.com/it-management/strategy-and-innovation/123458030/9-steps-realising-benefits-big-datas-promise

According to the Identity Theft Resource Center, to date there have been more than 778 million records exposed in thousands of data breaches. 

One of the foremost technology solutions for addressing the financial security concerns is Biometrics. Its application in the Banking and Financial Services industry is projected to increase to $8 billion by year 2020. This is largely due to less reliability of traditional authentication systems. Investing in biometrics is also seen as a lucrative opportunity today as banks and financial institutions all over the world want to implement it in their security systems as soon as possible.

To sum up, Biometrics in banking industry is now quickly evolving into a global standard. Read the following Investopedia article to increase your knowledge about this opportunity:

http://www.investopedia.com/articles/investing/042015/biometric-banking-huge-prospects-tech-profits.asp

According to a survey, the Indian fashion industry is likely to touch $77 billion in a next five year. To understand the changing customer behavior and have a competitive advantage, e-commerce firms and retailers can use analytics. In a research from Technopak, the share of apparels and lifestyle in e-commerce is likely to increase by 30% and e-commerce will contribute about 6% of apparel sales. Fashion industry faces a challenge of understanding customers want and require quick access to market dynamics.  E-Commerce in retail is increasing, and all channels, firms are looking for advanced analytics to understand consumer behavior. Read more at: http://www.business-standard.com/article/pti-stories/data-analytics-can-help-retailers-know-consumer-behaviour-115042000358_1.html

According to Collen Jones (CEO of Content Science and co-founder of ContentWRX), big data help to identify new market opportunities and customers. But, most companies are facing problem with analyzing big data. Therefore, before analyzing big data, an organization also needs to analyze small data. • Understand your situation by collecting and analyzing the data.
• Interpreting the data you collected in a clear and compelling way
• Searching what to do next?
Collected Data should be focused on content and customers and should be accurate and reliable. And while searching what to do next try to find opportunities and threats.
To know more read at: http://www.cmo.com.au/article/573077/thinking-big-data-marketing-get-small-data-right-first/

“If you live long enough, you'll make mistakes. But if you learn from them, you'll be a better person.”

- William J. Clinton

Trial and error are part and parcel of our everyday work. But, learning from mistakes and performing better, is what that makes the difference. In this article, Rachel Sprung, Product Marketing Manager at HubSpot, has shared some of the mistakes in the field of analytics that she had experienced. They are:

• Thinking low numbers are always a bad thing
• Confusing correlation with causation
• Confusing visits with views (and vice versa)
• Equating more time on a page with higher engagement
• Counting internal website visits toward your goal

 To know more and avoid such mistakes, visit the following link:

http://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/marketing-analytics-mistakes

According to the World Economic Outlook Database (WEO), released on April 14, 2015, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has predicted a not so good global growth scenario till 2020. Following are few of the highlights of the report:

• US growth has been revised lower- below 3%
• India’s GDP growth will not cross 8% till 2020
• The new normal in world growth - below 4%
• Commodity prices will remain low
• World trade growth will be muted

To know more, read the following article by Manas Chakravarty at livemint.com:

http://www.livemint.com/Opinion/Z3InMgIqNxSUOkB3Nch9AI/Five-trends-that-define-the-world-economy.html?ref=newsletter

According to Mary Shacklett (president of Transworld Data), organizations need big data and analytics capabilities for immediately transferring big data into actionable decisions. According to a Gartner September 2014 report, there is an increase in investment in big data by 64% from 2013. Jeff Kelley (Big data analytics analyst from Wikibon), says that “customers expect personalization when they visit websites, so companies need to develop analytical capabilities and in the long term apply real-time will grow as Internet of Things.” Preventive maintenance analytics can be developed, if data on the Internet to thing can be analyzed. To know more about real time analytics and Internet of Things read on:  http://www.techrepublic.com/article/surge-in-real-time-big-data-and-iot-analytics-is-changing-corporate-thinking/

Punk in Punk Analytics means working fearless and having an approach to ‘do-it-yourself way’. In the last few years with the rise of new technologies, we entered into the era of punk-style analytics. Some characteristics of punk analytics are:

• No barriers for information search, as you can download easily and free of cost.
• Mistakes are part of the process, but we can overcome by using analytics software and by having familiarity with the data.
• Fast and to the point is good.
• Idea should be transparent and it should have less processed time.
• Punk Analytics are basically concentrating on the issues of the moment, as it is the starting point for active exploration.
•   Working collaboratively is important to achieve a common goal.
To know more about punk analytics follow the article link of James Richardson (Business Analytics Strategist at Qlik): http://www.itproportal.com/2015/04/19/rise-punk-analytics/

According to Mike Proulx (Executive VP-director of Digital Strategy), social media marketing is also known as advertising. Social media marketing is also called paid marketing, as brands have to pay for showing the messages to target audience. Dick Costolo (Twitter), say that out of 20 tweets 1 is an advertisement. Brands are using social media for marketing as it more automated, targeted, instant, shareable and optimized. There are several ways to use social media marketing for advertising which are as follows:

• Open your wallet
• Play Blackjack
• Show Restraints
• Measure what matters
• Connect the dots
Read more at: http://adage.com/article/digitalnext/social-media-advertising/297841/

According to Jolanta Pilecka (Contributor), mobile users behave in a different way from desktop users. So, you need to add a little wizardry to ensure that it looks good on a mobile screen and different from desktop view. As mobile users want that with every step they reach to end goal and it should be quick, easy to access. Ways to optimize the mobile path:
• Don’t Shrink, Rethink
• Incorporate navigational cues
• Maximize native functions
• Incorporate Apps
• Get Your Data in order
 Therefore, for designing an app, you need to redesign your process from a mobile user perspective. Read more at: http://www.processexcellencenetwork.com/business-process-management-bpm/articles/don-t-shrink-rethink/

Breach of security has always been an important issue for any organization. Analytics has also provided a solution to this problem in the form of Security Analytics.

According to Eric Ahlm, Research Director at Gartner, "Security analytics platforms endeavor to bring situational awareness to security events by gathering and analyzing a broader set of data, such that the events that pose the greatest harm to an organization are found and prioritized with greater accuracy."

Two important applications of security analytics are:

• Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)        
• User Behavior Analytics (UBA)

To sum up, although security industry is still immature in the application of analytics, it still holds huge growth opportunities.

To know more, visit the following link:

http://www.firstpost.com/business/security-analytics-play-major-role-finding-breaches-says-gartner-2199152.html

An important application of analytics is Tax Analytics, which helps organizations, think differently about tax related issues and, thus, facilitates new approaches to improve business outcomes. A new function of tax analytics is to improve the understanding and management of the tax implications associated with short-term business travel. It helps businesses track travel of employees, identify areas of concern in states or countries, address locations of concern, and enhance payroll delivery by analyzing global travel-related data and potential tax implications. This creates a win-win situation for both the parties- the business and the employees traveling on behalf of the organization as it leads to cost reduction for business and satisfaction for employees.

To know more, read this interesting article by Beth Mueller, U.S. Tax Analytics Leader, Deloitte Tax LLP, in The Wall Street Journal:

http://deloitte.wsj.com/cio/2015/04/16/tax-analytics-spotlight-on-business-travelers/

The number of merger and acquisition (M&A) transactions involving insurance brokers and agents have shown a growing trend since last year. It’s important to speed up the post merger integration process for making these M&As successful. This is where the use of analytics technology comes in.

Some important areas where analytics technology is helping to make a difference in post-merger scenario are:

• Driving Efficiency
• Boosting Productivity
• Facilitating Teamwork
• Strengthening External Relationships
• Navigating Logistics
• Reconciling Different Corporate Cultures

To know more, read the following article at insurancejournal.com by Kabir Sayed, CEO of Riskmatch.

http://www.insurancejournal.com/news/national/2015/04/07/363528.htm

Analytics is seen as a ladder to succeed in today’s world. It reminds everyone of the benefits that one can achieve with its application in business. But is analytics always useful? What people chose to ignore is its downside. In retail sector, although analytics helps to predict demand, but it also helps to predict the employees required to meet the demand. This in turn, leads to less stable work hours for part time workforce. To reduce the harm to real people, retail analytics should be used in a responsible manner.

To know more, read the following Forbes article:

http://www.forbes.com/sites/sap/2015/04/15/abusing-the-power-of-retail-analytics/

According to Vincent Weafer (Senior Vice President of Intel Security), analytical capabilities will help you to be ahead of your competitors. Predictive Analytics help you to analyze the future trends more accurately and help you to realize your threats and opportunities which affects budget, purchase and staffing decisions. For prediction, a large amount of data is required from a range of activities which organizations perform, historical events and third party intelligence and to make predictive analytics more effective, you need to build foundational abilities like real-time hunting, prioritization and scoping of security incidents in their environment. You need to analyze your stakeholders for blocking decisions. Read more at: http://www.darkreading.com/partner-perspectives/intel/predictive-analytics-the-future-is-now/a/d-id/1319956

According to Saritha Rai (Contributor), e-commerce companies like Amazon, Snapdeal, ShopClues, Flipkart etc. find innovative solutions to timely delivery of their products by collaborating with Kirana stores, Dabbawallas in Mumbai, post office for reaching especially in rural areas and gas stations in Delhi and Mumbai. In a Morgan Stanley Report, Indian e-commerce market is expected to boom up to $100 billion in revenue by 2020. Timely delivery in the cities of India is a big challenge for e-commerce firms as roads are congested, streets are not numbered sequentially and customers many times don’t write zip codes or landmarks.  Finding these innovative solutions will not only benefit the e-commerce firms but it will also benefit local sources. To know more about these innovative solution read at: http://www.forbes.com/sites/saritharai/2015/04/15/from-dabbawallas-to-kirana-stores-five-unique-ecommerce-delivery-innovations-in-india/

According to Jacob Morgan, small teams are better than large teams because in small teams we find a fast decision with better communication between teams, less bureaucracy, etc. In the state of the American workplace report, in smaller organizations, employees are more engaged as compared to larger organizations and according to reports, 43% of employees work at companies of fewer than 10 employees are engaged at work whereas in big organization it is only 30%. According to the Ringelmann Effect, as the number of the employee increases they become inefficient. Social loafing helps us to understand why individual efforts reduce with the increase in size of the organization. Therefore, organizations should always think about their team structure. Read more at: http://www.forbes.com/sites/jacobmorgan/2015/04/15/why-smaller-teams-are-better-than-larger-ones/

According to Andre Lavoie, small business has to perform various tasks like accounting, marketing, the managing workforce, recruiting, operations, etc. Small businesses don’t have a separate HR department, so they ignore many HR tasks like making job analysis before recruiting, employee handbook, etc.  In a 2013 Career Builder Survey, it was found that the wrong hiring cost is more than $50,000. In a small business, due to less attractive job description they can't afford to hire the right candidate for their company. To help small business, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) also has guidelines to differentiate between employee and contractors.

Read more at: http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/245008

According to a 2014 survey of more than 2,000 business professionals by MIT Sloan and SAS Institute, 87% respondents share a common restlessness to elevate their organizations to the next level of analytics.

Being data driven, has now become a necessity for all businesses, especially financial institutions. Using predictive data analytics to interpret a wide range of internal and external data on customers helps financial institutions to identify best targets for a particular product and earn more by making timely pitches.

Russ Bunham, in his Forbes article, gives four tips on how financial institutions can use big data analytics to their advantage:

1. Creating a customized, consistent customer experience
2. Dissolving internal silos to have one view of the customer
3. Ensuring data insight flows to the right person to make the pitch
4. Using big data knowledge to enhance customer relationships

To understand them in detail, visit the following link:

http://www.forbes.com/sites/centurylink/2015/04/14/4-ways-financial-institutions-can-bank-on-big-data-in-2015/