Blog.

Building a data-guided business

Data has always had a big impact on business and trading. However, recent technology has made it easier than ever to collect and analyse data. These new developments have greatly changed the way in which data is used in business, providing almost real-time insights in a world where timing is everything. 

Lessons from sport

The book ‘Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game’ centres around a baseball team whose manager raises the profile of the entire team when he embarks on a journey to create the perfect baseball team based on analytical data. 

Even though the book was written over 20 years ago, the core principles of the book stand till today.

Firstly, it showed that analytics could be applied to almost any industry.

Secondly, it emphasised the ability of real-time data to have a huge effect on last-minute decisions. 

Time to catch up

So how do traditional business models embrace data when larger companies seem to have lapped them when it comes to utilising data? How do they play the game of catch up?

The best way to adopt data into your business is to start by having conversations with management and decision-makers. Once you have conveyed the value of data as it relates to the business you can start looking for solutions. Start consulting with data consultants to formulate a roadmap for your business. It should be structured in a way that non-data experts can easily understand the value of the strategy.

Always tailor your solutions

Even if there are businesses similar to yours, don’t get tempted to go out and duplicate their data strategy. Every business needs its own tailor-made solutions to reflect its business’ needs and values. You can cherry-pick what works and what doesn’t but there are certain nuances that can get easily overlooked if you try to copy-and-paste the strategy of another business. 

Coming up with a strategy that revolves around your business needs – its values, customers and employees is the best way to make sure that you are collecting and analysing the correct data. 

To summarise

Bringing your business’ data strategy in line with the big players can seem like a daunting task. However, with the right preparation and planning, you will be able to create a winning data-guided formula that will be in alignment with the vision and mission of your business. 

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