Employing Business Intelligence: Industries That Stand to Benefit

For modern enterprises, acting on a hunch in their routine workflow operations spells lagging hopelessly behind rivals in their niche. Most business owners realize this simple truth and try to collect customer-related data concerning their demographics and preferences as to the products offered by the company. Whereas smaller players do it on a limited scale, larger organizations invest a pretty penny in business intelligence (BI) software relying on state-of-the-art know-how to analyze historical processes, gauge the current condition of their company, and predict market trends that will shape the face of their industry for months to come. 

As contemporary civilization is rapidly taking the advancements of Industry 4.0 in stride, BI is becoming all the rage in the business world, introducing novel approaches and broadening the scope of activities it includes.

Zooming in on BI Operations

Business-intelligent means employing a plethora of information processing procedures that can serve as a benchmark for making data-driven business decisions. The range of such procedures is quite large:

• Data mining. This is not about finding disparate information (aka knowledge discovery in data) but discovering patterns and anomalies in datasets that have been detected. To streamline and facilitate the identification and collecting of relevant information AI and ML technologies are widely applied. 
• Data tracking. In the ever-changing world of the 21st century, data becomes obsolete very fast. BI tools provide instant access to pertinent current reports so that business owners aren’t too late in the steps they take.
• Data organization. Raw information is hard to work with so it should be arranged according to some measurements and dimensions that enable its subsequent analysis.
• Data visibility and synchronization. Seeing only a fragment of the entire picture (which is what separate departments within an organization usually suffer from) can distort the objectivity of your decisions. Business intelligence tools guarantee a 360 view which is vital for obtaining a single version of the truth.
• Data representation. Various visualization techniques such as tables, charts, and graphs can make cut-and-dry numbers more comprehensible for average personnel.
• Querying. Having access to complete information in a certain sphere, employees can get answers to specific questions within their competence.
• Data comparison and analysis. BI tools give a long list of options for benchmarking so that you can compare various datasets related to different sectors, or historical vs. current, to pinpoint discrepancies or similar trends. Such analysis can leverage either descriptive or statistical techniques depending on your ultimate goal and the peculiarities of the data involved.
• Reporting. Once the analysis is completed, its results are sent to all decision-makers who map out their business strategies accordingly. 

Given the unquestionable benefits of this IT-fueled mechanism, organizations in various domains—from higher education and sports to healthcare and digital marketing—apply BI on an ever-growing scale. 

Business Intelligence in Manufacturing

As an essentially data-driven field, manufacturing is susceptible to introducing BI practices into its workflow. When properly implemented, business intelligence in manufacturing can provide:

• All-out supply chain transparency. Supply chain analytics helps to avoid data siloing and enables tracking all stages of an item production and logistics, and in case something goes wrong, realizing what element underperforms.
• Manufacturing cycle monitoring. BI tools are instrumental in keeping the manufacturing cycle as short as possible paving the way for increasing the profitability of a company.
• Productivity enhancement. Managers can leverage BI to control the downtime of each employee or whole departments and keep it to a minimum by eliminating production bottlenecks that are likely to exist. 
• Augmented operational efficiency. When managers have all performance indicators at their fingertips, they will know where the shoe pinches and introduce necessary corrections.
• Inventory management. Storing of raw materials and finished products that take up warehouse space are a huge burden on the organization’s budget. Speeding them on their path to the processing facilities and end-users is what BI excels at. Besides, the downtime of manufacturing capacities can be avoided or radically reduced when the raw materials are timely acquired due to BI features as a part of modern ERP systems.
• Equipment control. Specialized BI metrics can help you monitor machinery usage and fine-tune it to reach its maximum efficiency by cutting down on downtime and providing proper maintenance.
• Quality assurance. Managers can monitor the ratio of products that don’t meet quality standards to assess how competent employees are, and in case it is high, alert the stakeholders responsible for personnel training. 
• Compliance monitoring. Enterprises function under stringent safety and performance regulations and by applying BI tools CEOs can make sure these regulations are followed. 

All of these perks that business intelligence in manufacturing ushers ultimately result in increased profitability of ventures that implement it. 

Business Intelligence in Insurance

Given the huge sums, insurance companies pay to cover their customers’ losses, the application of BI in this sphere is a must-have. What do companies get by implementing business intelligence in insurance?

• Fraud prevention. Experts estimate the annual amount of insurance fraud in the USA to exceed a staggering $80 billion. Companies try to defray these out-of-pocket expenditures by raising their rates—the outcome that customers don’t relish. Business intelligence in insurance can help avoid scaring away their clients because of such measures by providing predictive analytics honed to detect fraud attempts. This software identifies patterns that indicate possible fraudulent activities and alerts personnel to interfere.
• Efficient claim processing. This procedure involves going through a slew of various customer-related data. This complicated process can be remarkably streamlined and facilitated via applying BI tools to analyze client profiles, their previous claims, and other pertinent information.
• Risk prediction and management. Insurers can minimize their financial risks by reducing claims. BI algorithms can detect behavioral patterns of clients or weather developments that are likely to cause insurance events and forestall them by timely recommendations to take up sports, undergo preemptive therapy, get their car into a safe environment, etc.
• Database centralization. Drawing upon multiple in-house dossiers and information from open sources in their workflows, insurance companies waste a lot of time trying to align all data and make effective use of it. BI tools can not only store client and environmental data in one place but also detect which pieces duplicate and keep it regularly updated. 

Business Intelligence in Banking

Being calculating people, financiers know well the value of data, which explains the extensive application of business intelligence in the banking industry. According to estimates, business intelligence in banking brings almost 14% of total revenue in the BI market. In what workflow activities can the application of business intelligence in the banking industry become most useful?

• Risk management. Fraud in the financial sector is no less rampant than in the insurance industry, although here it takes other guises. Perpetrators try to cash in on taking unretrievable loans or engaging in all types of credit card fraud. BI mechanisms allow banks to trace suspicious behavior (such as atypical withdrawals, abnormal transactions, or anomalous big-ticket purchases) of potential wrongdoers and take prompt and efficient steps to prevent them from inflicting financial damage.
• Customer segmentation. By dividing clients into strata through specialized BI tools, financial institutions can better understand the needs of each group and customize their products and services to be a perfect fit for most of them. Moreover, such profiling can help discover the ideal customer (the one that brings more value) and prioritize them in all campaigns and marketing strategies. 
• Customer retention. Data drilling and analysis techniques utilized in business intelligence can not only display churn rate dynamics but also shed light upon the reasons why customers leave. Besides, they can detect telltale signs of imminent customer defection and alert employees to take urgent preventive actions. Plus, banks can map out loyalty programs and run targeted campaigns in order to retain clients and prevent average customer churn from turning into an exodus. 
• Enhancing operational efficiency. Business intelligence in banking can be inward bound as well when bank management aims to step up employee performance, maximize their expertise, and cut down on overhead expenditures. BI data analytic software can provide meaningful insights into critical workflow indices and serve as a point of departure in all further optimization initiatives.

Business Intelligence in the Public Sector

The application of business intelligence in government pursues essentially the same goals as in manufacturing, banking, or insurance: better services, optimization of workflows, and cost reduction. Yet here, it is citizens that should ultimately benefit by introducing business intelligence in the public sector. What aspects of government agencies’ operations can be improved by leveraging BI know-how?

• Intra- and inter-agency data exchange. Efficiently addressing the needs of individuals and communities is next to impossible without the ability of local, provincial, and national authorities to share information. Business intelligence in the public sector can allow for this opportunity by uniting disparate data that government agencies use into a consolidated database.
• E-government. A single databank can be beneficial for residents as well. Modern IT advancements have ushered in citizen self-help, or the ability of people to enjoy a wide range of public services via the internet. BI comprehensive infrastructure can make this open access data initiative available to millions of citizens.
• Budget management. To direct every public penny where it is most needed, authorities must develop profound insights into spending patterns and the capability to predict future commitments and expenditures. Business intelligence in government furnishes specialized tools that would immensely promote budget control and allocation.
• Customer intelligence. Public services can be adequately rendered only if governments know their consumers’ demands, demographics, and behavior inside out. Only here, consumers aren’t of a certain social, age, or professional target audience, but the entire community.
• Smart cities. With the across-the-board advent of the Internet of Things, the concept of a smart city is getting significant traction, encompassing a wide range of use cases—from municipal schools and higher education establishment management and traffic optimization to smart parking and waste collection. When enforced with BI analytic tools, this drive can yield astounding results in making the urban environment a comfortable place to live in for all community members.

Business Intelligence in the Retail Industry

This is a domain that must constantly keep its sails—or rather, sales—trimmed to the winds blowing along consumer shores. No wonder almost 60% of stakeholders in the sector consider business intelligence in the retail industry important or very important. Here, BI software can greatly help in:

• Managing multiple outlets. As retail empires expand over wider areas it becomes increasingly challenging to meet local consumer needs halfway, handle logistics, and uphold brand reputation. BI tools, with their data analytic capabilities, are a second-to-none means of managing such ramified organizations.
• Monitoring and forecasting consumer trends. Business intelligence in the retail industry largely focuses on assessing the current market situation and consumer preferences and divining their future development. Managers of stores must stay in the know of the latest trends and tailor their sales strategy correspondingly.
• Overcoming supply chain bottlenecks. Being understocked is one of the greatest nightmares haunting most retail business owners, whether they run a brick-and-mortar store or are involved in ecommerce and digital marketing. To avoid this coming true, they should keep the supply chain cogs turning ceaselessly, and BI predictive software can become an IT-powered lubricant that will always keep them oiled. 
• Sales personalization. When buying something at a retail outlet, fastidious consumers of the early third millennium greatly appreciate the personal touch and being dealt with on an individual scale. How can this be achieved? Only by compiling a comprehensive dossier on each (or at least most valuable) buyer persona that would contain the maximum info on their demographics, tastes, and consumer behavior. Collecting and processing a plethora of data on numerous customers via leveraging BI techniques is highly instrumental in client personalization efforts and administering targeted campaigns.
• Personnel management. All your consumer intelligence may turn out useless if your staff underperforms either in the business workflow or customer service. So the “know thy client” motto should be supplemented with another one—know thy employee. With this goal in mind, business intelligence tools can be leveraged along the same lines as when information about customers is collected and analyzed.

Summing It Up

With the exponential growth of competition in all business domains, the question “Should our organization employ business intelligence?” has lost its relevance. Now it sounds more like “How would the technology industry use business intelligence?” Today, companies with big-time aspirations realize the necessity of introducing BI techniques into their daily workflows. NIX United as a seasoned player in the market of business intelligence software can build a BI solution for any industry that will add value to your organization’s operational efficiency and boost your revenue.