All the decisions we make in business are done to improve that bottom line. After all, it doesn’t make sense to invest in something for your business that is going to have little or no return?
If you have been wondering if Business Intelligence makes sense for your application or business, it may be because the return on investment that BI can offer you seems questionable. Here are some ways in which your BI investment can be used to directly impact your bottom line.
Help End Users Make Meaningful Decisions
Business users can only make decisions based on the data that they are provided. If what they have access to is limited, then their ability to make meaningful decisions can be hampered. Self-service BI gives end users access to the data that they need to make better decisions. Even business users who traditionally may not have been able to contribute in this way can step up to the plate and offer ideas because they now have the means available to do so.
The speed at which these business users get accurate, actionable data adds to the ROI. When data insights lead to right time decisions that boost the organization’s bottom line, the investment shows a quicker return.
Give Better Insight into Customers
Businesses exist to serve the needs of their customers. A good business is able to continue to do this year after year by adapting to customer’s needs. A business that neglects to do this doesn’t stay in business for very long.
Through reports and dashboards, BI gives organizations access to the data needed to predict where customers are headed, based on their current behavior. It allows a business to stay one step ahead of where its customers are going. That aids the business or the ISV providing the BI solution for continuing to serve end users, give them what they want and provide it how they want it.
Reducing Costs
Another part of a successful business is knowing where to cut costs. Often, decisions on where to cut costs are made based on poor assumptions that ended up leading to more problems than are solved. BI can help leverage data to see where the best areas to target cost-cutting efforts might be.
BI reveals what parts of inventory are moving versus what parts are static. Cutting this extra inventory is one of the quickest ways to affect the bottom line and increase ROI. BI provides the data tools to quickly see what is moving so the business can adapt.
BI Can Boost Productivity
While the tendency is to think that BI is focused outwards, one of the biggest impacts it can make is when it is turned internally. Using BI to monitor employee productivity can be a great way to ensure that they stay focused on the task at hand and aren’t spending too much time doing non-work related activities, or devoting too much work time to the wrong job tasks. The amount of money lost on non-work related network usage can be rather staggering if added up. BI can be used to help limit this.
ROI for ISVs and Solution Provider
Most of these ways to measure the ROI of BI deal with the business user organizations. ISVs that implement BI solutions within their applications need to know the platform they choose can answer clients’ ROI concerns. But a software vendor has another set of measurements for its own investments in business intelligence. Read more about “The ROI of Embedded BI” for ISVs and solution providers, and a related report on “Monetizing Embedded Business Intelligence.”
Need help choosing the right business intelligence solution? Izenda’s solutions experts can help.
