You have likely heard the term business intelligence many times but may still struggle to understand it. The best way that we can describe business intelligence is an umbrella term that includes the infrastructure, processes, and tools that a company uses to access, analyze, and identify the most important information. Business intelligence software helps many organizations comb through millions of pieces of data to extract only that which is important for serving customers.
Systems and tools for business intelligence are compatible with both external and internal sources of data to uncover that which is most valuable. Examples of data that the typical marketer finds important include competitive intelligence points such as market trends. It also includes various internal insights like industry and customer pain points and information about the top stakeholders.
While business intelligence was an area primarily owned and operated by Information Technology (IT) departments in the past, today it is an essential business function for many organizations. The business intelligence of the past included complex data analysis and reports. Today’s business intelligence offers more solutions for more users across an entire company. It’s as simple as logging in to access a dashboard with analytics that automatically transfers raw data into real insights that marketing and other teams can use.
Understanding the Functioning of Business Intelligence
Business leaders depend on business intelligence software to enable them to make decisions to continually move the company forward. One of the primary benefits of business intelligence is that it removes reliance on the gut instinct and guesswork to providing something much more tangible to help in the decision-making process.
Some data sources that companies use to create business intelligence include Salesforce and other types of customer relationship management software. It also provides them with useful details about such things as meta data from call centers, marketing analytics, supply chain information, and dashboards outlining sales performance. By implementing business intelligence, companies can bring multiple sources together in a single location to provide real-time analysis, dashboards, and reporting for marketing representatives.
Business Intelligence in Action
Organizations use business intelligence to aid in decision-making in everyday tasks as well as essential strategy decisions that impact the future of the business. Here are some examples:
Analytics of Contact and Information: The analysis of customer interactions is an essential business intelligence function in most call centers across the country. A specific type of business intelligence called interaction analysis allows companies to monitor every incoming and outgoing phone call as well as instinctively identify key voice patterns to learn which phrases and behaviors are most effective. Business executives can then take real-time call performance data to train representatives performing at a lower level how to have a more successful telephone interaction with a customer.
Another benefit of interaction analytics is that it identifies phrases and speech patterns from calls that proved less successful in converting the caller to a paying customer. This tells management what they need to change. Lastly, interaction analytics ensure that your company remains in compliance by requiring call center representatives to use appropriate and legal language when speaking to customers.
Analysis of Closed Deals: Business intelligence is a useful tool for performing a win and loss analysis with sales. Many customer relationship management systems already come equipped with analytics that allow agents to create in-depth reports on deals they have closed in the past. These reports highlight common factors from both successful and unsuccessful sales. In theory, the representative should be able to tell the reasons for a closed or lost deal such as the consumer’s age, location, or gender.
If your company sells to other businesses, it’s important to learn which of its stakeholders your representatives tend to close deals with most often. For example, is the sale more likely to be successful when closing with a marketing executive or the vice president of sales? Closed deal analysis can answer questions like this.
Analysis of Website Traffic: As the most common form of business intelligence tools, Google Analytics provides excellent insights into website visitors. Owners of websites can establish email alerts and reports to view information such as the referral page, whether the search was paid or organic, and time spent on each page. Google Analytics, as well as similar tools, can show you the web domain of the visitor as well. This helps you know which companies are landing at your site along with the pages they view. This is important because most website visitors don’t complete a contact form.
Best Practices to Implement Business Intelligence
Call Sumo recommends considering the following before deciding which business intelligence tools to implement.
Implementation: Be sure to factor in training time when establishing a time frame for implementation.
Integration: How well does the new form of business intelligence fit in with the technology stack your company already uses? Will you be able to integrate it easily or will it require a lot of customization? It’s essential to know these things before starting.
Simplicity of Use: Make sure that the solution you offer your team is intuitive and simple to use. Adoption rates will suffer with complex solutions, which means you’re unlikely to see the desired outcome.
Please contact Call Sumo with additional questions about business intelligence.
