Posted by Ray Malendewicz on Thu, Jul 15, 2010 @ 03:20 AM
So the World Cup is over and I suppose that we will have to get back to doing some real work instead of being the ultimate fan by looking at the World Cup Qlikview application.
I learnt quite a lot from this Business Intelligence application about the World Cup. For example I did not know that the Dutch East Indies appeared in the tournament. They did so in 1938. Actually more surprising is that it was still a Dutch colony then and did not gain independence, as Indonesia, until after the Second World War in 1949. Other useless information includes the fact that the majority of goals were scored with right foot shots and that the majority of teams, excluding England, had more midfield players booked than defenders. I guess the conclusion form this is that most players are right footed and that defence begins in midfield.
I am confident that, given some time, I can develop some completely useless Key Performance indicators that someone at the Football Association could latch on to and use as measures of real importance to the future of English football.
I am really looking forward to QlikView offering the next application. Hopefully we will not have to wait until the European Nations cup in two years before we are able to waste a few precious hours in finding some useless, but interesting, facts.
Anyway enough of this rubbish. Let’s get back to the real world. Yesterday I posted a blog about providing PDF reports
from QlikView. This has always been a problem but one that QlikPower has provided a neat solution. It will allow you to provide attractive reports without having to use Excel.
To find out more contact QlikPower through our web page and we can show you how it is done using your data.
Posted by Noel Shannon on Thu, Jun 24, 2010 @ 05:50 AM
I attended a really excellent Sales Directors Forum last week
and it really woke me up to the demand out there in so many organisations for better data analysis. The organisers from
Treacy Consulting did a superb job in getting over 30 Sales Managers and Sales Directors from different organisations to meet to discuss the challenges facing them as we get through the recession. Among the topics discussed were their responses to the following questions
1. Do you expect a year on year increase in sales for 2010?
2. How has your sales headcount changed in the last 2 years?
3. What sales team headcount are you predicting for the next 12 months?
4. Does your company forecast an increase in bad debt provision/ collection for the next 12 months ?
In their responses to the questionnaire, which had been filled out in advance, the attendees had indicated that they were spending money on CRM systems (50%), Search Engine Optimisation (50%), and Blogging & Social Media (68%). But when the discussion started I was fascinated to note that many wanted better and faster data analysis to be made available to them for immediate decision making in so many different areas.
Value versus Volume
A large Drinks Manufacturer wanted better Key Performance Indicator (KPI) measurement to determine what product mix they should be promoting. He pointed out that in difficult times we need better data and data analysis so that we can understand how to grow value when we cannot grow volume. In order to do this we need to better understand the Promotional Mix and this is driven by Customer Insight. ‘Promotions that are not measured are a waste of money’ he said. Their product is the same drink but packaged and promoted in different ways. They have a large family pack, different size bottles and cans, different adverts and promotions and so on. There is obviously a different cost profile associated with the different product mixes and so the challenge is to better understand the value that can be extracted from promoting the optimal mix. This can only be done by constantly measuring the demand at a granular level and delivering this information accurately and in an intuitive way so that the decision makers can do a better job. For this to be done they would need better Key Performance Indicators and better data analysis.
Business Intelligence
QlikView is the Business Intelligence solution for this. Demand can be tracked over time – different outlets will have different social groupings and age profiles – these can be measured and mapped against the demand for the different products and for different time frames, even for different hours in the day. The Point of Sale system can deliver the information from all the outlets and this can be fed directly into
QlikView. Using its powerful associative software
QlikView can instantly analyse and show trends – and more importantly it can alert the user to unusual patterens and even predict future demand.
Posted by Ray Malendewicz on Mon, Jun 21, 2010 @ 07:41 AM
My last blog talked about the changes that I have seen in the use of Business intelligence tools. I thought that perhaps this one could discuss the importance of Business Intelligence reporting.
Business Intelligence reporting is a subject that has created a lot of interest, many comments and many BI solutions. There are numerous groups and web sites that discuss the subject in great detail. Even searching the Daily Mirror produces the odd result for Business Intelligence. Sadly no such results can be found in The Sun so you will have to find another excuse to look at page three.
Business Intelligence is important because it enables users to make decisions that affect how an organisation is run.
Forbes tells us that many companies are turning to business intelligence to help them to get a better understanding of the Key Performance indicators that drive their business.
A recent report by Accenture suggests that high performing companies are more analytical than lower performing businesses. They are more likely to have business intelligence capabilities, business intelligence reporting, and data that is integrated and analysed across the business rather than in silos.
But, for most Business Intelligence tools, the cost and time involved in implementing a Business Intelligence solution is prohibitive. In fact many consulting organisations advise you to start slowly and then build up. This, however, can prove to be difficult because there is often a need to build a data warehouse. As it would be inefficient and expensive to continually add to a data warehouse these tend to be built before users can take advantage of Business Intelligence reporting.
At QlikPower we have found that one of the advantages offered by Qlikview is that, as a data warehouse is not required, data from the whole business can be analysed. As importantly it allows you to start slowly and then build up. You will quickly be able to gain the benefits of Business Intelligence reporting without the huge cost of developing a data warehouse.
Want to see what QlikView can do? Why not try out our
World Cup App